Title: Importance, barriers and future of Clinical Pharmacy development in Georgia

Biography:

Nikoleishvili Elza is a Medical Doctor –Pediatrician. She has 13 years clinical experience and more than 10 years of teaching experience. She has completed her PhD at the age of 37 years from Tbilisi State Medical University and Postdoctoral Studies from faculty of Medicine, Tbilisi State Medical University, Georgia. She is the Head of Pharmacy department of The School of Health Sciences and Public Health of The University of Georgia. She has published more than 45 papers in reputed journals. She has participated in various international congresses and workshops. At present she is Professor at The University of Georgia.

Abstract

Around the world, the role of the pharmacist has been rapidly evolving from a traditional role in drug distribution to expanded clinical roles such as making medication-related recommendations to other members of the health care team, identifying drug therapy problems, assessing patients and prescribing medications, and administering medications s. Clinical pharmacy services are firmly established in many countries, associated with reduced adverse drug events, medication errors, patients’ length of stay, mortality rates, and costs (Anderson & Schumock,  Bond & Raehl,  De Rijdt, Willems, & Simoens, ;  et al.,). A core element of clinical pharmacy is to influence rational prescribing and promote quality use of medicines. The statements developed by the International Pharmaceutical Federation (FIP, 2009) strategically frame the role of clinical pharmacists regarding their influence on rational prescribing. According to Bulletin of the World Health Organization 2018 in high-income countries, clinical pharmacy services have been shown to improve quality use of medicines and reduce drug-related problems, hospital readmissions and health-care expenditures.  Implementation of clinical pharmacy  services could faces various challenges, such as: (i) lack of clinically qualified pharmacists; poor pharmaceutical literacy among patients;  under-utilization of research evidence due to underdeveloped health-care systems (iv) restrictions in medicines regulatory capacity; (v) poor availability of essential medicines; and (vi) limitations in accessing high quality medicines ( Brazinha L, Fernandez-Llimos F, Laura V Minard, Heidi Deal, Frnandes O, Goman SK,at al ). Over the last two decades, the Government of Georgia has initiated several reforms in the health sector to move away from the highly centralized Semashko model inherited from the Soviet Union. However, Implementation of clinical pharmacy is in its infancy in Georgia. 2017 in  Pharmacy department at The University of Georgia was created Master program of Clinical Pharmacy. We hope this program will play important role for implementation and development clinical pharmacy in Georgia.