It is an honor to serve as your ACCP president for the next year. During my Incoming President’s Address at the 2016 ACCP Annual Meeting, I spoke about my theme for the upcoming year, “Interprofessional Collaboration: From Theory to Reality.” As I reviewed the themes from the past several years, a common thread emerged. From year to year, each president’s theme was another step in moving ACCP forward. I hope to build on that momentum this year with a focus on collaboration. Our mission statement calls for ACCP to advance human health by extending the frontiers of clinical pharmacy (https://www.accp.com/about/mission.aspx). The statement goes on to say that this will be achieved through “strategic initiatives, partnerships, collaborations, and alliances” that allow ACCP to provide the leadership, professional development, advocacy, and resources our members need to excel. Over the past decade, ACCP has clearly demonstrated a commitment to its mission by supporting the expanding role of clinical pharmacists in interprofessional education (IPE), practice, and research. I believe this is the ideal time for our organization to celebrate our achievements in promoting interprofessional collaboration within health care and to explore future opportunities.
Like many of our members, I work as part of an interprofessional team every day, providing patient care and teaching students and residents from pharmacy, medicine, and nursing alongside nursing preceptors and attending physicians. I also participate in interprofessional clinical research. I value these collaborations, as well as those occurring on a larger scale among professional organizations.
IPE is the foundation for developing effective team members. As stated in the World Health Organization’s Framework for Action on Interprofessional Education & Collaborative Practice (http://whqlibdoc.who.int/hq/2010/WHO_HRH_HPN_10.3_eng.pdf):
Once students understand how to work interprofessionally, they are ready to enter the workplace as a member of the collaborative practice team. This is a key step in moving health systems from fragmentation to a position of strength.
In 2007, the ACCP Task Force on Interprofessional Education developed a white paper that defined IPE and suggested strategies for promoting and implementing it both within and outside our profession. The resulting paper, “Interprofessional Education: Principles and Application. A Framework for Clinical Pharmacy” (www.accp.com/docs/positions/whitePapers/InterProfEduc.pdf), and the accompanying ACCP Position Statement on Interprofessional Education and Practice (www.accp.com/docs/positions/positionStatements/IntprofEducPracPosStmntFinal.pdf) were forward-thinking documents that advocated for a comprehensive and sustained commitment to IPE in both the didactic and experiential settings for all health professions.
Much has changed since these documents were published. IPE is now widely accepted as a key component of the pharmacy curriculum. The Accreditation Council for Pharmacy Education Standards 2016 state that all students must be prepared to practice patient-centered care as a member of an interprofessional team, with IPE as a component of their didactic, introductory pharmacy practice experience (IPPE) and advanced pharmacy practice experience (APPE) training. Similar interest in IPE within other health professions led to the formation of the Interprofessional Education Collaborative in 2009 and publication of its Core Competencies for Interprofessional Collaborative Practice in 2011, with a subsequent revision in 2016 (www.aacn.nche.edu/education-resources/ipecreport.pdf). Despite this progress, there is still much to do. Many institutions continue to face challenges in meeting their IPE goals. The 2017 Educational Affairs Committee is charged with revising the white paper produced by the 2007 Task Force. They will review the current state of IPE among pharmacy schools, identify innovative practices, and propose new ideas for providing IPE in the classroom and practice settings.
Interprofessional collaboration within health care teams is essential in the provision of comprehensive medication management (CMM) (www.accp.com/docs/positions/misc/CMM%20Brief.pdf). During the 2016 Annual Meeting, we heard presentations from Drs. Mary Roth McClurg and Todd Sorensen, the lead investigators of a multiyear study of the value of clinical pharmacists in enhancing primary care medical practice through CMM that is supported by a $2.5 million grant from ACCP and the ACCP Research Institute (RI). The project is moving forward, with shared learning and some early benefits in the development of common terminology among the study sites. Periodic updates on the study will continue in future issues of the ACCP Report.
The number of clinical pharmacists engaged in interprofessional collaborative research continues to grow. The ACCP RI’s Focused Investigator Training and Mentored Research Investigator Training programs as well as the Futures Grants program have supported many of our members’ development as researchers and scholars. In addition, the ACCP Practice-Based Research Network (PBRN) is developing several new projects. I would like to thank the Practice and Research Networks (PRNs) for continuing to support their members by providing scholarships to attend RI training programs and funding projects submitted to the PBRN. To provide further benefit to our members in clinical practice, the Research Affairs Committee will create a web-based resource guide featuring a comprehensive list of programs and tools that promote the development of research, scholarship, and professional writing skills. This addition to the ACCP website will aid clinicians or clinical faculty in identifying resources that can be used at their practice site to assist them in meeting their goals for scholarship, quality-related projects, or clinical research.
In addition to expanding our interprofessional collaborations this year, ACCP will highlight collaborative and complementary activities within the profession. The Certification Affairs Committee will devise methods to promote the Board of Pharmacy Specialties (BPS) Value of Certification initiative (www.bpsweb.org/wp-content/uploads/Value-of-Certification-Initiative.pdf). As part of its work, the committee will develop content for the ACCP website to provide additional background information on board certification for our members and resources highlighting the value of board certification for both employers and the public.
Finally, I would like to thank all of our volunteers. Each year, hundreds of ACCP members serve the organization as officers, committee members, abstract reviewers, speakers, and manuscript reviewers. Our members have readily volunteered to represent ACCP on collaborative projects such as consensus papers, guidelines, and committees that are writing specialty petitions for BPS. Over the past several months, more than 1000 members completed ACCP strategic planning surveys, and almost 100 attended focus groups at the 2016 Annual Meeting that will inform our work on the organization’s new strategic plan. The strategic planning process continues, and I ask for your continued support. Your commitment to ACCP is greatly appreciated and your expertise highly valued.