The medical field is composed of several licensed professionals to ensure that quality healthcare is provided. One of the most sought-after medical professionals is a pharmacy technician.
Everyone is probably already familiar with pharmacists but what makes a pharmacy technician different from them? One of the common misconceptions about pharmacy technicians is that they are only there to assist pharmacists and handle payments. However, they have also licensed professionals who fulfill a much bigger role.
So, in this article, we will get to know who a pharmacy technician is and their roles in the medical field.
Who Is a Licensed Pharmacy Technician and How to Be One
A pharmacy technician is a licensed healthcare provider that works with licensed pharmacists. A pharmacy technician performs pharmacy-related functions such as handling paperwork, monitoring the medicine inventory, and handling payments. Other pharmacy-related functions are creating box labels, talking to customers, supervising other pharmacy staff, etc. Pharmacy technicians work in hospitals, pharmaceutical industries, and primary healthcare.
The license is awarded to individuals who have taken and successfully passed the Pharmacy Technician Certification Board (PTCB) exams. The PTCB exam has multiple-choice questions and has a duration of two hours. The concept of PTCB exam revolves around topics regarding medications, patient safety, and quality assurance.
Roles of Pharmacy Technician in the Medical Field
As mentioned above, the role of a pharmacy technician goes beyond getting payments and assisting pharmacists. So, here are some of the roles a licensed pharmacy technician fulfills.
- Receiving and Confirming Prescriptions
An important role of a pharmacist technician is to receive and confirm prescriptions. Pharmacy technicians are the front-line workers, one of their key jobs is to collect information from patients. The pharmacy technician checks the patient’s name, phone number, insurance information, address, etc. Pharmacy technicians need to pay great attention to detail while receiving and confirming prescriptions to avoid mistakes. The pharmacy technician also helps measure how many medications go into prescriptions and label the prescriptions after receiving them.
The importance of this role is usually overlooked as it doesn’t seem so complicated. However, one small mistake on dosage or dispensing the wrong medication can compromise lives. That is why only licensed individuals are allowed to do this. The pharmacy technician must ensure the prescriptions are filled and look up the medicines to avoid mistakes. He or she must also check the dosage proscribed by the pharmacists.
When a patient is administered too many drugs, the medications could counteract each other. The pharmacist can make a mistake. A pharmacy technician should be able to catch such mistakes and show them to the pharmacist so they can be corrected. The pharmacy technician interacts with the patient before taking the medication, so they must check the medication. This helps reduce and eliminate error rates in pharmacies and ensures the patients are using the proper medication.
- Organize and Manage Inventory
Pharmacy technicians need to track the inventory for medications in the pharmacy. The pharmacy inventory can contain items like drugs, medical equipment like syringes, needles, etc.
As healthcare providers, establishments and professionals should always make sure that medication is always accessible. One way to do this is to keep a fully-stocked inventory. A licensed pharmacy technician makes sure that they are always stocked by checking supplies and placing orders once needed.
- Accept Payment and Enter Customer Information
A pharmacy technician accepts and processes payment from patients. This process is done alongside checking the right prescription. Pharmacy technicians are the ones who process insurance claims and dispense medicines covered by the said insurance.
After payment, the pharmacy technician needs to enter the customer’s or patient’s information such as insurance number and medicines bought. Before, technicians used to do this manually. But since the world has gone digital, computer systems have made it easier to input and track patient information.
- Pharmacy Technicians Perform Investigational Drug Service (IDS)
A pharmacy technician is expected to perform investigational drug services. Pharmacy technicians provide support in all aspects of clinical trial management. Pharmacy technicians work closely with sponsors, principal investigators, research teams, and drug suppliers to ensure compliance with research guidelines.
Some of the top investigational drug services performed by pharmacy technicians are listed below.
- They receive investigational drugs in accordance with established institutional guidelines and sponsor requirements.
- Order and maintain inventory-specific logs.
- Work with IDS pharmacists to set up and operate new clinical trials monthly billing and payroll activities.
- Maintain and manage temperature storage guidelines set by the sponsor.
- Track monthly metrics for IDS workload activity.
- Meet with sponsor representatives to ensure proper research maintenance and resolve potential issues.
- Manufacturing and dispensing protocol-specific drugs according to institutional and sponsor-specific procedures.
- Create and update standardized operating procedures for engineer roles. Train new technicians and research pharmacy staff.
- Special Medications and Delivery Methods
Pharmacy technicians interact directly with patients who self-administer the drug at home. In hospitals and pharmacies, most interactions are with doctors and other medical staff, and medications are mainly given by nurses. Everything from the type of medicine prepared by the pharmacy technician to the delivery method of the medicine is unique to the hospital or pharmacy.
Special medication services delivered by the pharmacy technicians are listed below:
- Dosing in the nursing ward, operating room, emergency room. This includes STAT dosing and daily replacement of the dosing cart.
- Make sure the crash cart is properly supplied with the medication needed for the facility.
- Manufacture of trays and kits (CPR, transport, etc.) and replenishment of anesthesia trolleys.
- Wear specific clothes in specific places (OR, IVR, etc.)
- Drip Round-Titration monitoring and calculation.
- Manage the inventory of automatic dispensers.
- Monitoring of diversion of regulated substances.
Conclusion
A pharmacy technician plays an important role in the medical field. Although they are often overlooked, the process of dispensing proper medication wouldn’t be as smooth and accurate without them. Pharmacy technicians need to perform their roles efficiently.
This article talks about their different roles so that individuals who aspire to be one can have a better grasp of the role. Further, clients would know them better.