Industry Spotlight: National Hospital & Health-System Pharmacy Week is October 21st -27th, 2007

The American Society of Health-System Pharmacists (ASHP) sponsors this week-long celebration during American Pharmacists Month. The week focuses on the important contributions made by pharmacists and technicians to promote the safety and well-being of patients in our nation's health care institutions.

The MEDITECH Community Bulletin will use the occasion of National Hospital & Health-System Pharmacy Week, October 21-27, 2007, to underscore the importance of the role which pharmacists and pharmacy technicians play as members of multidisciplinary patient-care teams. Not only do they play a critical role in preventing medication errors and advising providers on the best drug choices, but hospital and health-system pharmacists have been able to take on enhanced patient-care roles because of the deployment of new technologies like dispensing robots, medication label bar coding, and advanced clinical information systems which provide instant access to both drug and patient data.