Impact of credentialing and provider privileges on clinical interventions made by advanced practice pharmacists in California

Abstract

BackgroundThe Advanced Practice Pharmacist (APh) licensure has provided an opportunity for pharmacists to expand their scope of practice in California; however, there have not been any studies in California assessing the interventions made by APhs as credentialed providers of care. ObjectiveTo assess the clinical interventions made by APhs as credentialed providers with clinical privileges in an independent community pharmacy. MethodsThis was a retrospective, observational study that assessed clinical interventions made by APhs on patients referred for disease state management between January 2018 and December 2018. Pharmacist interventions were stratified into 3 levels of provider care: full privilege (FP), limited privilege (LP), and no privilege. ResultsFP had the highest percentage of accepted recommendations (62.2% ± 20.1%), whereas LP and no privilege had lower percentages of accepted recommendations (41.9% ± 12.0% and 31.6% ± 3.7%, respectively) (P < 0.01). ConclusionAPhs as credentialed providers with FP, or even LP, made more successful clinical interventions than those without any privileges.