Integrating Family Medicine and Pharmacy to Advance Primary Care Therapeutics

Recent health policy documents have endorsed an integrated model of collaboration between pharmacists and physicians in primary care. The integration of pharmacists into primary care has been identified as a priority for primary health care reform in Canada. However, the best way to do this has not been demonstrated or evaluated. This demonstration project shows the various ways in which pharmacists can be trained and integrated into different family practice settings, the processes and costs associated with doing this, and the outcomes observed. The main hypothesis is that pharmacist integration into family practice will optimize medication use, clinical care and clinical outcomes. This information provides policy makers with necessary information about collaboration between pharmacists and family physicians for their overall goal of reforming the delivery of primary health care to the population.