Pharmacist News and Research

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There are many tasks that a pharmacist is responsible for each day. Pharmacists are some of the most accessible members of the healthcare team, as individuals can seek their advice quickly and easily, even without an appointment.

Pharmacies are turning away immunocompromised patients seeking 4th covid shot

Patients with weakened immune systems — who are at high risk from covid-19 — say pharmacies are turning them away when they seek additional vaccine doses recommended by federal health officials.

25 Jan 2022

I write about America’s absurd health care system. Then I got caught up in it.

I got a hurried voicemail from my pharmacist in Wisconsin the day before Thanksgiving letting me know my insurance was refusing to cover my insulin.

25 Jan 2022

Eligible adults urged to take part in world-first COVID-19 study of antivirals

Adults over the age of 50 or with an underlying health condition who test positive for COVID-19 are being urged to sign up for a world-first COVID-19 study which is providing life-saving antivirals to thousands of people.

24 Jan 2022

New opportunity to induce remission of peanut allergy in young children through oral immunotherapy

A clinical trial funded by the National Institutes of Health has found that giving peanut oral immunotherapy to highly peanut-allergic children ages 1 to 3 years safely desensitized most of them to peanut and induced remission of peanut allergy in one-fifth. The immunotherapy consisted of a daily oral dose of peanut flour for 2.5 years.

21 Jan 2022

What patients can learn with confidence from one negative rapid test (hint: very little)

Julie Ann Justo, an infectious disease clinical pharmacist for a South Carolina hospital system, hoped Christmas week would finally be the time her family could safely gather for a reunion.

13 Jan 2022

$Common osteoporosis medications protect against hip fracture during a 2-year drug holiday$

Common osteoporosis medications protect against hip fracture during a 2-year drug holiday

New research findings may help physicians and older adults with osteoporosis better manage their hip fracture risk while taking a break from their medication. The first-of-its-kind study, published in the Annals of Internal Medicine, found that the oral bisphosphonates risedronate and alendronate equally protect against hip fracture during a 2-year drug holiday.

13 Jan 2022

Slight pH adjustment may turn a metabolic inhibiting drug into promising COVID-19 treatment

Mechanical engineering and materials science professor David Needham has shown that a slight increase in solution pH might be all it takes to turn a metabolic inhibiting drug, traditionally used to treat gut parasites, into a promising prophylactic/preventative nasal spray and early treatment throat spray for COVID-19.

7 Jan 2022

Distrust in state power closely linked vaccine hesitancy

Distrust of the state in Turkey, religion and abortion resistance in the United States. Politics and culture are just as important in explaining vaccine hesitancy as health.

5 Jan 2022

Deep roots help this Chicago pharmacist avoid creating another drugstore desert

Del-Kar Pharmacy in the North Lawndale neighborhood has had a front-row seat to history. Martin Luther King Jr. bought his daily newspaper there when he lived in Chicago in the late 1960s.

23 Dec 2021

Local pharmacists fill Rx void as big brands pull out of rural areas

Bill Mather, a pharmacist in the small Iowa city of Greenfield, wanted to make sure his neighbors could fill their prescriptions without driving long distances or enduring long wait times.

20 Dec 2021

Seeking refills: Aging pharmacists leave drugstores vacant in rural America

Ted Billinger Jr. liked to joke that he would work until he died. That turned out to be prophetic.

17 Dec 2021

A rural Georgia community reels after its hospital closes

Lacandie Gipson struggled to breathe. The 33-year-old woman with multiple health conditions was in respiratory distress and awaiting an ambulance. About 20 minutes after the emergency call, it arrived.

10 Dec 2021

Abortion remains safe after removing restrictions on the medical abortion pill, study finds

Abortion remains safe after Canada removed restrictions on the medical abortion pill mifepristone in November 2017.

9 Dec 2021

CDC expands recommendations for COVID-19 booster dose to include all adults

Today, CDC Director Rochelle P. Walensky, M.D., M.P.H., endorsed the CDC Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices' (ACIP) expanded recommendations for booster shots to include all adults ages 18 years and older who received a Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna vaccine at least six months after their second dose.

19 Nov 2021

New research finds disturbing lack of crucial blood cancer medication

New research in the November 2021 issue of JNCCN-;Journal of the National Comprehensive Cancer Network finds fewer than one-third of hospitals had immediate availability of a crucial blood cancer medication called all-trans retinoic acid (ATRA).

16 Nov 2021

How rural communities are losing their pharmacies

Batson's Drug Store seems like a throwback to a simpler time. The independently owned pharmacy in Howard, Kansas, still runs an old-fashioned soda counter and hand-dips ice cream. But the drugstore, the only one in the entire county, teeters on the edge between nostalgia and extinction.

15 Nov 2021

Educational program on anticholinergic burden aims to improve health outcomes of older people

Falls, confusion, cognitive decline, dry mouth, constipation and urinary retention. In a new NPS MedicineWise podcast episode released today, Dr Kate Annear, NPS MedicineWise medical adviser and GP talks about the new NPS MedicineWise educational program on the cumulative effects of anticholinergic medicines.

15 Nov 2021

Flu season emerging against the backdrop of COVID-19 pandemic

For the second straight year, flu season is emerging against the backdrop of the COVID-19 pandemic. While the number of flu cases was relatively low last year, experts at Johns Hopkins Medicine say that this year, it could be much higher.

11 Nov 2021

Clinic-based review board helps reduce opioid prescribing

An internal medicine clinic at Oregon Health & Science University has sharply reduced the amount of opioids prescribed though innovative use of a review board comprising a team of health care professionals from various disciplines to ensure patients' needs are being met.

9 Nov 2021

CDC expands COVID-19 vaccine recommendations to about 28 million children aged 5-11 years

Today, CDC Director Rochelle P. Walensky, M.D., M.P.H., endorsed the CDC Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices' (ACIP) recommendation that children 5 to 11 years old be vaccinated against COVID-19 with the Pfizer-BioNTech pediatric vaccine.

2 Nov 2021