Aim: To evaluate oncology day therapy pharmacists’ perception on current workload including the impact of electronic prescribing in a 44-chair day therapy unit with a staffing ratio of approximately 20-25 patients to 1 EFT pharmacist.
Method: A questionnaire was given to all day therapy pharmacists involved in the clinical verification of anti-cancer systemic treatment charts, coordination of treatment supply and counselling of take home medications. The survey evaluated their perception on current workload, impact of electronic prescribing and time it takes to review treatment plans and counsel patients with different complexities.
Results: 8 pharmacists responded to the questionnaire with 5 pharmacists having < 5 years of oncology experience (group A) and 3 pharmacists with ≥ 5 years of experience (group B). 75% pharmacists considered the ratio of patient to pharmacist as appropriate and 1 pharmacist from each group considered it was too high. All the pharmacists with experience working with both paper and electronic prescribing thought the workload increased after the switch to electronic prescribing citing reasons such as extra information to navigate between and time for pages to load. The self-perceived time to review a chart ranged from 4 to 14 minutes for group B and 6 to 23 minutes for group A. For counselling, group B ranged from spending 9 to 16 minutes with patients and group A, 13 to 29 minutes.
Conclusion: Overall the day therapy pharmacists considered the current workload appropriate but it was interesting to note the perceived increase in workload from electronic prescribing. The time needed to review and counsel appears higher for the less experienced pharmacists. Further research as a time-motion study would be helpful in further analyzing and optimizing the work of a day therapy pharmacist.