Pharmacy Daily | Butler plots ‘sensible’ full scope push

ENSURING all health professionals, including pharmacists, can work to their full scope of practice will be key to managing workforce shortages, Federal Minister for Health and Aged Care, Mark Butler, believes.

Addressing the opening session of the Pharmaceutical Society of Australia's (PSA's) Conference on Fri, Butler described the push to have pharmacists operating to their maximum potential, as "unfinished business" from Labor's last term in office.

"It just doesn't make sense to me as an Australian, but also as a Health Minister, that the enormous investment the community makes in training hundreds of thousands of health professionals is limited by not allowing people to operate at the top of their scope," he said.

"It doesn't make sense to me, as demand for healthcare is climbing dramatically - leaving aside the impact of COVID-19, we continue to have constrained supply of health workers - not to have every single healthcare professional, whether they're doctors, nurses, allied health professionals or pharmacists, working as close as possible to the top of their scope.

"I know as well as you do that, that's a contested proposition, and it's not easy to step through that proposition without enlivening turf wars that can become very debilitating for community confidence, as well as substantive outcomes.

"It's something we tried to do when we were last in Government... and for the Labor Party I see it very much as unfinished business, something that I do want to come back to."

Butler also flagged the launch of the Department of Health and Aged Care's consultation process about the role of on-site pharmacists in aged care.

"We've got to define the role of the on-site pharmacists," he said.

"We've got to ensure that we're very clear about training requirements for those pharmacists who will be working in residential aged care.

"Funding models will be important, and also that we're able to measure health outcomes."

With negotiations for the Eighth Community Pharmacy Agreement (8CPA) on the horizon, Butler noted that the inclusion of the PSA as a co-signatory of the 7CPA was "an overdue and welcome advance... it's one that I can't see any reason to not reflect as we move into negotiations for 8CPA".