What is public health?
Public health can be defined as “what we in term of society do to persuade the
conditions in which people can be healthy.” It is not about medicine, but it also
“emphasizes” the prevention of disease and the needs of the population health as a
whole.
Read Also - Best career option after Completing D. Pharm in India
What are Public health services?
Public health services occur on two measures: the macro measures and micro
measures i.e., planning and the implementation of planning, respectively.Macro-
level public health measures target on the health of the population as a whole.
These services include identification of health-related community problems with
community representatives, planning community health programs and policies,
administering and evaluating community health promotion programs, educating the
community about public health, and researching and publishing facts about public
health actions. All these activities are exercised by public health professionals of
different backgrounds.Micro-level public health measures consist of the activities
necessary to execute public health plans. These services are carried out on a
“program-to-population or a provider-to-patient basis”. For examples; the screening
of diseases, tobacco-cessation programs immunization programs, and counseling
for at-risk populations.
The overall concept beneath these so many public health activities is prevention,
which can be categorized into three types: primary prevention secondary
prevention and tertiary prevention i.e., reduction of the occurrence of diseases,
decrease the progression of the disease, and treatment of disease to return the
initial state respectively.
What should be the public health activities of a
Pharmacist?
In 1981, the role of the pharmacist in public health is defined by the American Public
Health Association (APHA). This association outlined that the role of the pharmacist
is now escalating beyond the dispensation and distribution of medicines, and health
supplies. Today, the administrative, and public health functions are also included in
the services of pharmacists. Now, it becomes more patient-oriented. A pharmacist
can provide many services to public health that may include pharmacotherapy,
provide care, and prevention measures. A pharmacist has an available resource for
health and medication information apart from dispensing medicine. Due to valuable
placement of pharmacists in the clinical community, the integration of public health
custom into pharmaceutical care, and pharmacological training is indispensable.
Read also Various Pharmacy degree programs in India
The public health services that an individual pharmacist performs will depend on
the abilities, experience, training, and work methodology. APHA believes that all
pharmacists can contribute to the promotion of public health by working alone or in
cooperation with health care colleagues and administrators. The following are the
other activities where pharmacists can play an important role to promote public
health:
1. Population-based Care:
The Center for Advancement in Pharmaceutical Education (CAPE) Educational
Outcomes suggested that pharmacists should involve in both patient-based and
population-based care. In the past twenty years, the health-system pharmacists can
support public health efforts using designing and providing disease management
programs. The health-system pharmacists with their health care colleagues can
contribute to population health care using tools such as medication-use evaluation,
evidence-based disease management programs that are planned according to the
needs of the served institutions and communities. Health-system pharmacists can
involve in quality reviews by which they assure that evidence-based treatments are
used for all patients to help assuage population health care.
2. Prevention of Disease and Medication Safety:
A pharmacist can be indulged in the prevention and control of disease in a many
ways. They can help in the establishment of some screening programs to check out
the status of immunization, and identification of some undiagnosed medical
conditions. The federal government’s Healthy People 2010 initiative is also outlined
the role of health-system pharmacists in medication safety and error prevention.
These practices can reduce the number of hospital admissions due to reasons for
drug therapy mismanagement and counterfeit medications. Medication
reconciliation programs are one of the vital tools with which pharmacists can
achieve these goals.
3. Health Education:
The development of programs on the safe and effective use of medication, and
other public health-related topics, such as exercise, healthy nutrition and tobacco
cessation, is also an important area where pharmacists play their role. The
education and training programs are beneficial for public health care if they
start on at an early age, such as school health programs, which help in the
development of good health behaviors in children that can continue into adulthood
also. Pharmacists should support these types of school health programs.
Furthermore, health-system pharmacists can educate their health care colleagues
about the safe and effective use of medication that further improves use of
medications. The pharmacists can also educate community leaders like public office
holders, legislators, school officials, regulators, and religious leaders who involve in
public health customs.
4. Public Health Policy:
Health-system pharmacists can participate in the development of public health
policy concerned with local boards of health as well as national programs. Drugs are
the central part of health systems. Hence, the health policy, especially policy
targeted for chronic disease, must be prepared with better consideration of drug
therapy as well as factors affecting the disease outcomes. The role of Health-system
pharmacists in emergency planning and service delivery of specialized
pharmaceuticals like antidotes, vaccines, and antibiotics is critical. APHA also
outlined the role of health system pharmacists as assistant in procuring, distributing
and dispensing emergency supplies of pharmaceuticals, medications and
immunization products and managing the drug therapy of individual victims with
National Disaster Medical System assistance teams, the National Pharmacy
Response Team or local units of the Medical Reserve Corps. Pharmacists, as
medication-use experts, should also work in the assistance of health-system
administrators to develop policies for the best management practices in the proper
handling and disposal of hazardous drugs.
5. Research and Training:
A health-system pharmacist must get adequate education and training to carry out
his responsibility in public health. Health-system pharmacists should be expertise in
pharmacoepidemiology, research methodology, and biostatistics with their
applications in decision related to public health. He should have an understanding
of the design, conduct, and interpretation of clinical studies. Health-system
pharmacists should participate in collaborative research and serve on data
monitoring and safety committees, institutional review boards, and expert
medication advisory committees. Moreover, the research fellows need exposure to
research in public health policy, pharmacoeconomics, pharmacoepidemiology, and
evidence-based medicine for experimental and instructive training. Health-system
pharmacists should also work in collaboration with public health policymakers,
governmental agencies, medical centers, and academic institutions to promote
optimal pharmacotherapy.
Future Aspects
The revolutionary progress in biomedical sciences, including stem-cell biology,
human genomics, biomedical engineering, immunology, and bioinformatics, open
the door to provide information for the betterment of human health. New
technology and practices such as population genetics and pharmacogenomics will
allow reduction in failures of treatment and prevent adverse drug reactions using
the proper appliance of pharmacogenetic principles. Health-system pharmacists will
need to apply these new tools not to get better patient-specific pharmacotherapy
but to progress public health. Health professionals, as well as the legislators, will
require education and training about the safe use of new medication delivery
technologies
