More than 300 individual ACCP members have joined the ACCP PBRN Registry since the online registry went live at the end of January 2009. An additional 257 pharmacists have joined from other existing PBRNs. A list of ACCP PBRN members by individual PRN appears in the table that follows.

ACCP PBRN Members by PRN^a,b

^aMembers may select more than one PRN.
^bTotal individuals registered = 302.

The ACCP PBRN registry is open to all ACCP members who are involved in direct patient care or have access to patients for research purposes. No research experience is required. However, like any human subject research project, the ACCP PBRN requires each member to have taken part in human subjects protection training. If your institution does not offer this training, a no-cost online training module is available. Contact the ACCP PBRN at [email protected] for more information.

More Clinicians Needed

Not many pharmacists have been exposed to PBRN research and are thus not familiar with it. Recently, a member expressed her interest in joining the ACCP PBRN but was concerned that she was “just a clinician” and had no research experience. In fact, both clinicians and clinical researchers are the type of members we are looking for to join the ACCP PBRN. In particular, clinicians (whom we often refer to as PBRN members), many of whom may or may not have any research expertise, are much needed. Practice-based research cannot be conducted without clinicians because they are essential in generating research ideas from practice and helping to translate research findings into practice. The role of the ACCP PBRN is to provide collaborative opportunities among members and clinician-researchers, as well as the informatics infrastructure, data collection tools, training and education, grant writing, IRB consent form templates, and other services to our members. We share one common goal in desiring to solve practice questions through practice-based research efforts.

However, a certain amount of work will be required of each site wanting to participate in any particular study. Members will need to obtain IRB approval at their local level before enrolling if unable to use central IRB approval. More importantly, each ACCP PBRN member and site may choose the studies in which it wants to be involved. It is a win-win situation for both the clinicians and clinical researchers.

Members interested in learning more about PBRNs or the ACCP PBRN in particular are encouraged to visit our Web site at www.accpri.org/pbrn. We are currently developing a demonstration project for the PBRN. According to the Board’s direction, this project will have the potential to involve as many ACCP PBRN members as possible, regardless of their practice settings. Once the demonstration project is well under way, we will begin opening up the ACCP PBRN to individual grants and proposals from our membership. Please stay tuned for updates as we move forward. In the meantime, we encourage you to register today. To our fellow established pharmacist PBRN researchers, we ask that you register your PBRN with us. The Registry can be found at http://www.accpri.org/pbrn/registration.aspx.

Now is the time to join the ACCP PBRN. We want to show our external funding agencies the capacity and unique capabilities and strengths that will make the ACCP PBRN not only the first national clinical pharmacy PBRN, but also representative of the depth and breadth of experience that makes ACCP unique. Please contact us at [email protected] if you have any suggestions or comments.