Pharmacoprudence

If you are looking for a single word to describe the varied job functions of the clinical pharmacist, that word is "pharmacoprudence".

 We, members of the Apothecary fraternity, have inherited a very fortunate heritage; a word to describe any field of particular study or endeavour, old or new, of a natural origin or acquired, may be formed by simply prefixing the root morpheme " pharmaco-" (obtained from the Greek pharmakon, for drug) to a tail word with a suggestive character. Hence we have in our lexicon words such as pharmacology, pharmacognosy, pharmacokinetics, pharmacodynamics, pharmacopoeia, pharmacopaedia, pharmacotherapy, pharmacogenomics, pharmacoepidemiology, pharmacovigilance, et cetera; words which are each pregnant with ideas which otherwise could only have been expressed sufficiently through elaborate usage of common vocabulary.

 The word "pharmacoprudence" first appeared in the year 2012 in an article published as an Idea Paper in the online journal INNOVATIONS in Pharmacy. In that seminal paper the word "pharmacoprudence" was originally suggested as the terminological equivalent of the word "jurisprudence" and was conceived to carry parallel connotations.

 Jurisprudence, as used in common notion, means the study of the nature and administration of law. On the same level pharmacoprudence may be explained simply as the study of the components and administration of healthcare. In that seminal paper the term "pharmacoprudence" was defined as 'the science and practice of the rational, efficient, efficacious and economical utilization of therapeutic agents'. It embodies such interrelated concepts, specialized learning and activities as clinical pharmacology, pharmacotherapeutics, pharmacoeconomics, pharmaceutical compounding, complementary and alternative therapy, rational drug utilization, medical records management, medication use reviews, pharmacovigilance, pharmacoepidemiology, pharmaco-medical information systems management, medical sociology, et cetera.

 In parallel with the lawyer who is the advocate of a client in the administration of law, the clinical pharmacist is the advocate of the patient in particular, and the whole healthcare system in general, to safeguard against abuse and misuse in the process of delivery of healthcare services. Like the former the services of the latter should have to be solicited for by a client, when pharmacoprudence is practised in a private office, but where the clinical pharmacist is an employee of a healthcare institution the performance of the role of pharmacoprudence becomes a professional obligation. Again, like the lawyer, the clinical pharmacist should have to specialize and confine his/her practice to a few, selected medical and/or pharmaceutical specialties to ensure concentrated learning and activity.

 Indeed so much similarities may be found upon detailed analysis of the job functions of both the lawyer and the clinical pharmacist that the juxtaposition of the terms jurisprudence and pharmacoprudence is more than apt. Furthermore, the term "pharmacoprudence" is more excellent in beauty in comparison with the phrase "clinical pharmacy", in the sense that the former circumvents a very serious ambiguity that inheres in the usage of the latter; the fact that the phrase "clinical pharmacy" naturally restricts this field of practice to only practitioners within conventional healthcare institutions, to the exclusion of community pharmacists and pharmacists who may perform same job functions in private business offices. In contrast, the term pharmacoprudence captures all these practice settings.

 Therefore I commend the term "pharmacoprudence" to you as preferred to the traditional phrase "clinical pharmacy", for your usage both in your lay and technical discussions, so that you avoid unnecessary ambiguity and carry your communications forcefully.


 References:
Adjei M. Clinical Pharmacy: A Theoretical Framework for Practice. Innov Pharm. 2012; 3(3): Article 83. http://pubs.lib.umn.edu/innovations/vol3/iss3/2.