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In the more than thirty years I have practiced pharmacy, I have witnessed a tremendous evolution in the profession. The clinical foundation and training of a pharmacist graduating today is leaps and bounds above where I started my practice. However, one thing has not changed: a pharmacists’ role in patient care goes well beyond dispensing medications...Today, as before, many pharmacists provide patient-centered services...We are the front line of the health care team and often see patients more than any other provider. Pharmacists have become the most over-trained and under-utilized professionals in America...While doctors should remain the quarterbacks, pharmacists must be given "provider status" so the profession is able to be the integral part of the health care team we are trained to be...With provider status, pharmacists would be added to the list of Medicare providers which would not only allow for the best possible care for patients but would also ensure it is done in the most cost-effective manner...In my short time in Washington I have come to realize just how hard it can be to advance commonsense reform...a bipartisan majority of 272 members have cosponsored the Pharmacy and Medically Underserved Areas Enhancement Act introduced by Representative Brett Guthrie. This legislation simply gives pharmacists provider status...let’s move forward...to improve access to quality and affordable health care for all Americans.

India's lower house of parliament passed a bill this week to back a regional biotech center aimed at promoting expertise and research in South Asia and wider in the Asian region...The Regional Centre for Biotechnology--to be located in the northern state of Haryana--would offer degrees up to the doctorate level, while also serving as a home to academics with access to research facilities in biotechnology...India has lagged in comparison to other Asian nations such as Japan, China and Australia in growing a local biotech industry...The new center would seek to aid growth domestically in biotech as well as establish links abroad by offering course work training and research in biotechnology to students and researchers...

A lawmaker wants to allow California addicts to use heroin, crack and other drugs at supervised facilities to cut down on overdoses, joining several U.S. cities considering establishing the nation's first legal drug-injection sites...The proposal...comes as San Francisco, Seattle, New York City and Ithaca, New York, weigh ordinances to set up the facilities, citing the success of a site operating in Canada since 2003...law enforcement has opposed the move in California, saying it will worsen addiction. And lawmakers seemed reluctant to support it, postponing a committee vote...The bill from Democratic Assemblywoman Susan Talamantes Eggman would make it legal for local and state health departments to allow the use of controlled substances in clinics that would offer medical intervention...Supporters say the facilities would reduce deaths and transmissions of HIV and hepatitis C...

Florida recently became the 10th state to restrict the sale of cough medicines containing dextromethorphan to adults over the age of 18, a move lauded by industry...a law addressing the issue of cough medicine abuse among teens...limiting teen access to DXM is an effective way to prevent abuse. We are assured that this legislation will empower parents to prevent abuse among their children, while continuing to ensure access for the millions of families who responsibly use products containing DXM to treat common cough symptoms...

A bill to have the nation's largest Medicaid program cover comprehensive medication management services by pharmacists and primary care physicians emerged from a committee hearing on April 5...In the past few years, we have added millions of Californians into Medi-Cal, making the effective management of the quality and cost of care an absolute necessity...CMM is a smart, important innovation to help meet these goals...CMM, according to California Assembly Bill 2084, is "the process of care that ensures each beneficiary's medications...are individually assessed to determine that each medication is appropriate for the beneficiary, effective for the medical condition, and safe given the comorbidities and other medications being taken, and [that] all medications are able to be taken by the patient as intended."...Absent from the bill, however, was any requirement for Medi-Cal to pay pharmacists for providing healthcare services or for Medi-Cal managed care plans to credential pharmacists as providers...pharmacists' strongest support comes from the rural areas of California, where access to healthcare is more difficult than in the urban centers of the state...

A congressional committee is proposing an amendment to a spending bill that may intensify the debate over the safety of compounded medicines...The House Appropriations Committee has introduced language that would alter a key requirement for pharmacists to make and dispense compounded medicines, which are generally customized for specific patient needs. And the language runs counter to a draft guidance that the US Food and Drug Administration released...that would govern compounding practices...Specifically, the amendment would allow pharmacists to compound medicines without needing prescriptions for individual patients. This has been a contentious issue in the wake of the 2012 outbreak of fungal meningitis that was tied to a compounding pharmacy and led to 64 deaths. The episode underscored confusion between federal and state oversight of compounders...the Drug Quality and Security Act went into effect to sort out enforcement authority...it...created two classes of compounders — traditional compounders who make medicines for individual patients, and others who resemble drug makers by making large amounts of a drug. These compounders must register with the FDA and are subject to greater federal oversight...The Pew Charitable Trusts...argued that the language proposed by the House committee would blur that distinction. And the nonprofit contended the change could jeopardize public safety...International Academy of Compounding Pharmacists..."The FDA continues to ignore clear congressional intent where the states have clearly indicated pathways in which pharmacies can participate in office-use compounding. The 2017 appropriations bill reinforces this intent."..."FDA’s draft guidance on anticipatory compounding is confusing at best and may ignore the clear language of bill when it comes to defining this practice,"…

In the latest effort to push back against drug costs, the California legislature will hold a hearing on Wednesday to review a bill that would require companies to report any move to increase the list price of a medicine by more than 10 percent during any 12-month period. And drug makers would have to justify price hikes for medicines with a list price of more than $10,000 within 30 days of making such a move...The legislation, which would also require insurers to provide regulators with spending data on prescription medicines...The...bill "will bring prescription drugs in line with the rest of the health care sector by shedding light, for the first time, on those drugs that are having the greatest impact on our health care dollar," said state Senator Ed Hernandez...The Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America...in its own letter opposing the bill, argued that the reporting requirements are "extraordinarily broad" and would potentially apply to many drugs for which the impact of a price hike on insurance premiums would be "essentially" minimal and "would reflect an imperceptible change in the total cost of care."...BioCom maintained that the bill fails to require payers and pharmacy benefits to similarly disclose their reasons for increasing copayments, deductibles, and out-of-pocket expenses for consumers...

State lawmakers are poised to make Hawaii one of a handful of states that allow psychologists to prescribe medication in hopes of increasing access to mental health services...The...bill would allow psychologists to prescribe medication if they undergo special training. It sets requirements including 400 hours of training, supervision of 100 patients and passing an exam created by the American Psychological Association...So far, psychologists in the Department of Defense can prescribe medication, along with those in New Mexico, Louisiana and Illinois. Just this week, lawmakers in Iowa approved a similar bill. Supporters of the Hawaii bill say those states can serve as a model for increasing access to mental health care...Outreach workers say Hawaii is in the midst of a mental health crisis. More Hawaii residents die by suicide than in car accidents, according to the Hawaii Department of Health...But opponents including the American Psychiatric Association and the Hawaii Medical Association say the bill would put Hawaii residents with mental illness at serious risk. They say some psychologists might not have the proper medical training needed to safely prescribe drugs that can cause deadly reactions, especially when mixed with other medications...

Critics of how prescription painkillers are administered in the U.S. are calling on health officials to phase out hospital procedures and questionnaires used to manage pain...They say the current system inadvertently encourages the overprescribing of addictive drugs like Vicodin and OxyContin, fueling an epidemic of overdoses tied to the opioid medications. Deaths linked to misuse and abuse of prescription opioids increased to nearly 19,000 in 2014, the highest figure on record, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention...More than five dozen nonprofit groups and medical experts sent a letter...to the Joint Commission, a nonprofit agency that accredits U.S. hospitals, asking it to revisit its standards for pain management...The letter specifically takes issue with guidelines instructing doctors to ask patients to assess their pain...Aggressive management of pain should not be equated with quality health care as it can result in unhelpful and unsafe treatment...a bipartisan group of senators introduced legislation that would eliminate the connection between pain survey questions and the payment rates hospitals receive from Medicare.

A Colorado lawmaker (Dan Pabon) is trying to outlaw marijuana-laced gummy candies that resemble children's treats, the latest effort...to address the complexities and unintended consequences of pot legalization...In 2014 Colorado became the first state to allow the sale of marijuana for recreational use, and it has grown to be a billion dollar industry in the state...there are no distinguishing characteristics between the gummy bear that contains marijuana and one that does not...Numerous children in Colorado were hospitalized after becoming critically ill as a result of ingesting edible marijuana products after pot became legal...