Pharmacists propose education standards for those caring for patients with kidney disease
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Nephrology pharmacists have proposed education standards based on six main topics for pharmacists caring for kidney patients.
“The Advancing American Kidney Health (AAKH) initiative aimed to transform kidney care with goals of decreasing the incidence of kidney failure and increasing the number of patients receiving home dialysis or a kidney transplant,” Joanna Q. Hudson, PharmD, from the departments of clinical pharmacy and translational science and medicine at the University of Tennessee Health Science Center, and colleagues wrote. They added, “To support this AAKH-catalyzed opportunity for pharmacist engagement, the pharmacy workforce must have a fundamental knowledge of core principles needed to provide comprehensive medication management to address chronic kidney disease and the common comorbid conditions and secondary complications.”
In 2020, nephrology pharmacists gathered to create the Advancing Kidney Health through Optimal Medication Management (AKHOMM) initiative. Two workgroups formed to create practice standards and to build education standards for nephrology pharmacists providing comprehensive medication management (CMM) to patients with kidney disease. In a perspective published in Kidney Medicine, researchers presented the group findings.
The workgroups met monthly for 1 year to draft education standards for nephrology pharmacists in outpatient clinics. Topics considered included CKD care, the fundamentals of CMM, processes of patient care delivery, patient advocacy and health disparities.
Following the drafting process, all members and the AKHOMM leadership reviewed the standards.
The AKHOMM finalized 28 education standards in the following six categories: 1) CKD (progression, comorbidities and complications); 2) drug regimen design and medication safety; 3) public and population health; 4) comprehensive medication management and processes of care delivery; 5) advocacy and health disparities; and 6) special populations (transplantation and pediatrics).
“The education standards are not inclusive of all potential topics that pharmacists may need to know in a CKD setting, but they include those identified as core or foundational topic areas. The intent is for these education standards to complement the practice standards for pharmacists in outpatient nephrology settings developed through the AKHOMM initiative,” Hudson and colleagues wrote. “As more information develops regarding the role of pharmacogenomic testing and implementation in patients with kidney disease, the education and practice standards will be modified to incorporate this important element.”
According to the perspective, the AKHOMM plans to use the finalized education standards as a framework to build a curriculum for practicing pharmacists in need of kidney disease-focused advanced training programs.
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