Use of Computers in Pharmacy

A survey was performed to identify nurses’ competence with computer databases. Many of the practicing nurses studied claimed they did not feel comfortable navigating a database to locate research information. Many were either not aware of helpful tools such as CIANHL and PubMed or did not utilize these tools due to their inability to access or navigate them. Patient charting and detailed drug information is all computerized, therefore, universities need to place emphasis on computer literacy and familiarize nursing students with computer databases if they are to be

Studying at the West-Mec Pharmacy Technician program will eventually help me reach my long term goal of becoming a hospital pharmacist. This program will give me the benefit of hands-on training and will teach me the necessary skills that are required for a pharmacy technician. I want to have a career as a pharmacist in the future and I understand that becoming a pharmacy technician is not required, but it is a huge benefit. Pharmacists dispense medication and other remedies. They need to understand the importance of doses, allergens and other chemical reactions that may cause harm to the patients. Because of this, pharmacists are important to the medical field. I chose a pharmacist as my career because I want to ensure that my patients

As the first generation in my family to go to college I learned the importance of education. I graduated from Benedictine University with a Bachelors in Science and an Environment Certificate. I became intregted by pharmacy when I started to spent countless hours at a hospital watching my grandfather go in and out of surgeries and treatments for cancer. Seeing the different medication being handed to him inspired me to understand biological and chemical processes that happened. A Pharmacists, role is to aim to help patients treat illness by introducing new developed treatment of medicines with a range of patients. I began to take special interest in memorizing all my grandfather’s medications and how practical and clinical aspect pharmacy worked.

There is no substitute for common sense and diligence, but technological advances may be of use in helping to prevent medication errors. Technological measures include automated medication dispensing machines, computerized IV administration, and the bar coding of both patients and drugs. A research study conducted among a select group of nursing students at a suburban New York university was designed to answer the question: Does the use of PDAs (personal digital assistants) with drug and medication calculation software improve the accuracy and efficiency of medication administration (Greenfield, 2007)? Results of this study upheld the hypothesis that the use of PDAs and medical software did, overall, improve the accuracy and efficiency of medication administration. The author of the study recommends that all nursing students be required to have PDAs with drug and calculation software on them. There is evidence to

As expert on drugs, it is the responsibility of pharmacist to make drug related intervention when necessary. When on rounds, the rest of the team ask drug related questions from the pharmacist and expect the pharmacist to make recommendations especially on antibiotics stewardship, renal dosing, pharmacokinetics, and pain management. While on rounds, I witnessed pharmacist answer to such call. With less than a year of classes left before I start my APPE, I hope to consolidate on my previous pharmacotherapy knowledge and make valuable improvement in my problem solving skills and critical thinking

(Lowe, Plummer, O'Brien, & Boyd, 2012). They are re prepared with advanced didactic and clinical education.

In a changing healthcare environment, the role of the pharmacist has evolved from primarily dispensing to monitoring and managing drug therapy in collaboration with physicians and other providers. As a result, pharmacy technicians are beginning to take on some of the technical aspects of pharmacy practice. This means that better educated, more qualified technicians will be needed in the future.

based on the latest evidence base and in line with hospital policy and is done so following telephone discussion with a doctor as there will be no one to check the accuracy of that prescription at night. Through the use of electronic prescribing my choice of drugs and drug doses will be influenced. Another major influence in the decision to prescribe is my own level of knowledge and competence and by ensuring that all prescribing is carried out in accordance with my own scope of professional practice to ensure patient safety. As suggested by Spicer (2006) professional autonomy when prescribing will be limited by the use of guidelines and protocols, however these guidelines support safe prescribing and the protection of the patients in our

Patient/member web portals are becoming more mainstream in today's healthcare industry because of the advance in internet web-based services as well as the rise in health information technology. According to Miller (2009), the growth in internet access in today's healthcare practices has driven an increase in the use of patients web portal by many healthcare organizations (both nationally and worldwide) due to its much-secured interface and broader features compared to e-mail.

Nursing informatics which is a very important part of the health care system has evolved over the years to the point where three main important components: basic computer skills, informatics knowledge, and information literacy (Hart 2011) are used to define it. I scored 69 on the patch test which means I am comfortable with using computer applications that are friendly, I am aware of the usefulness of computers in different settings and have a fair idea of current computer capabilities in health care.

Nurses in clinical practice are constantly challenged to deal with an abundance of information and multiple technology systems. Use of a computer terminal with various types of information and use of communication technologies are expectations for health care personnel, including nurses. Estimates indicate that since the 1980s, approximately 50% of all new capital investments in health care organizations have been in information technology. Informatics can aid nurses by enhancing personal and private communication among health care staff, accessing or transferring information about patients, retrieving up-to-date health care information, sharing new or common knowledge among colleagues, and assisting in making

In this so-called Digital Age, with instant access to the internet at our fingertips, it is not unusual to see pharmacists use websites as a tool to do research on information that could help them further their field of interest. The website bpsweb.org by the Board of Pharmacy Specialties (BPS) is one of them. The objective of this website is to provide information for qualified pharmacists who are interested into becoming a Certified Specialty Pharmacist and help them to get certified. BPS is an effective website in terms of its visual elements and composition (formatting, audience, purpose, visual design, content), several rhetorical strategies were also employed to increase its effectiveness.

Not only does the electronic method of prescribing save time, it has also cut down on the number of accidents caused by the misinterpretation of handwriting. Although now almost obsolete, hand-written prescriptions have been the cause of many medical errors because certain sound-alike or look-alike drugs have, in the past, been incorrectly substituted for one another. A report given by the insurance company, Excellus BlueCross BlueShield disclosed that if all physicians were to begin using electronic-prescription systems, “more than two million adverse reactions or events – ranging from inconsequential to severe – could be avoided each year” (wgrz.com). According to pharmacist and associate director for the Food and Drug Administration’s Office of Drug Safety, Jerry Phillips, “Six-hundred sound-alike or look-alike drug pairs have been identified as possible sources of error since 1992” (nytimes.com). For example, Lamictal, a mood-stabilizing anticonvulsant, is quite similar in spelling to Lamisil, an antifungal drug. Because of these strong similarities, it is not difficult to understand how easy it could be for medical personnel to mistake certain medications. But with e-prescribing, because the prescription is sent directly from the prescriber to the pharmacy, the number of accidents caused by misinterpretation of handwriting has already been

Technology has begun to replace skills, such as learning how to use a thesaurus, solving long division problems, or learning how to use critical thinking skills. Some students have failed to learn because of the abuse of technology that is occurring in the learning environment. The internet has brought more resources to schools around the world but some of the important skills in the learning process are being substitute for the mass of resources the internet has provided. The result of this abuse of technology is a student passing the curium without

Being proficient in using technology will be a prerequisite for almost any employment for younger students. It is the school’s job to prepare many of these kids for employment, and that is especially true for the lower socioeconomic areas where students with computers at home are rare. Eisenberg and Johnson describe this basic skills education as the “laundry list” approach to computer education. By ‘list” they mean isolated skills, such as word processing, or searching the Internet. “Students need to be able to use computers and other technology flexibly, creatively and purposefully. All learners should be able to recognize what they need to accomplish, determine whether a computer will help them to do so, and then be able to use the computer as part of the process of accomplishing their task.”1