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Why did the College implement the Practice Review Program?
The College implemented the Practice Review Program to enhance the quality of pharmacy practice by improving compliance through strengthened enforcement. One of the ways that the College can ensure best practices are being followed is to establish and communicate standards and guidelines to pharmacy professionals and review their individual performance in a pharmacy setting. By reviewing real practice in real time, the College is helping to maintain and elevate public confidence in the profession.
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How does the Practice Review Program work?
The Practice Review Program has two components: the Pharmacy Review and the Pharmacy Professionals Review. The Pharmacy Review component will be a familiar process, as it mirrors the College’s previous pharmacy inspection process. For the Pharmacy Professionals Review, a College compliance officer will observe and assess individual pharmacy professionals in four key areas of practice. Compliance officers will ensure that pharmacies meet College standards/guidelines and that pharmacy professionals are appropriately applying their knowledge, skills, and abilities to deliver consistent pharmacy care.
Pharmacy Managers and pharmacy professionals will receive advance notice of a Practice Review and will know what will be reviewed. Pharmacy managers and professionals will also receive their results once the review is completed.
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How will scheduling work?
Every pharmacy will be reviewed cyclically on a multi-year time frame. The College will be looking at a number of factors when scheduling reviews.
The College will confirm a date for the Pharmacy Review with feedback from the pharmacy manager. Registrants will be individually contacted by the College to confirm the dates for their Pharmacy Professionals Review if needed.
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What if there are scheduling conflicts for staff who are sick or on holidays?
The College understands that at certain times of the month or year it may be inconvenient to have a compliance officer in the pharmacy. The College will do its best to work with the pharmacy manager to determine the least disruptive times.
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What is the College looking for during the Pharmacy Review?
Compliance officers will be reviewing pharmacies for adherence to practice standards and guidelines such as the Health Professions Act, College Bylaws, Standards of Practice, the Pharmacy Operations and Drug Scheduling Act, Professional Practice Policies, and other legislation.
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What is the College looking for during the Pharmacy Professionals Review?
Pharmacy professionals will be reviewed on focus areas that have been deemed the most relevant to professional pharmacy practice in British Columbia. The Board has identified a total of six focus areas they believe to have the greatest impact on public safety. Focus areas differ between pharmacists and pharmacy technicians. Each will be reviewed on four focus areas depending on their registration type:
The focus areas for pharmacists are:
- Patient Identification Verification
- Profile Check
- Counseling
- Documentation
The focus areas for pharmacy technicians are:
- Patient Identification Verification
- Product Distribution
- Collaboration
- Documentation
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What criteria or specific details will the College be looking for under each of the four focus areas of the Pharmacy Professionals Review and the Pharmacy Review?
For information on specific assessment criteria, please refer to the following review forms:
For Hospital Pharmacy:
- Hospital Pharmacy Review Form
- Hospital Pharmacist Review Form
- Hospital Pharmacy Technician Review Form
For Community Pharmacy:
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What happens after the review has been completed?
After the review has been completed, the compliance officer will forward the Pharmacy Review results to the pharmacy manager, and individual Pharmacy Professional Review results to each pharmacy professional. These results will be available in real time, accessible online through the confidential and secure eServices portal. The compliance officer will discuss results with the pharmacy manager and individual pharmacy professional for their respective reviews.
Where a compliance officer observes a standard/guideline that is not met, they may assign action item(s). These observations and action items are standardized to ensure consistency and fairness of all practice reviews. Pharmacies and pharmacy professionals will be given deadlines (typically 30 days) to complete these items, and compliance officers will verify whether the action items have been completed by the deadline. After all action items have been completed, the compliance officer will sign-off on the review, and a notice of completion will be issued to the appropriate party.
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Hospital Pharmacy: How Do I Create the Pharmacy Professionals Review Schedule?
It is the pharmacy manager’s responsibility to schedule individual Pharmacy Professionals Reviews for all registered pharmacists and pharmacy technicians employed at their site.
To create the Pharmacy Professionals Review schedule, the pharmacy manager should refer to the existing staff schedule, the staff roster, as well as the Pharmacy Professionals Review Scheduling Template provided by the College in the selection email. The pharmacy manager can simply plug in names to the College template and send a copy to the PRP Coordinator as soon as it is complete and no later than two weeks prior to compliance officers arriving on-site.