Interventions to improve patient pharmaceutical care outcomes.

Implementing pharmaceutical care entails the application of communication skills and cognitive skills-skills that pharmacists have certainly used in the past, although not specifically for evaluating their patients' drug therapy. Before pharmacists can start the pharmaceutical care process, they need to establish the therapeutic relationship with their patients. Pharmacists need to be active listeners and demonstrate empathy for patients. They then need to interview the patient and collect relevant data to evaluate patient drug therapy and health status. Critical thinking skills improve pharmacists' abilities to identify drug therapy problems. Pharmacists can then use the problem-solving process to resolve the drug therapy problem. It is important that pharmacists create care plans to help guide their patient care activities and planned interventions. The final step in the pharmaceutical care process is the pharmacist's documentation of patient care activities.