title: Spirometry: tool for pharmacy practitioners to expand direct patient care services.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  To introduce pharmacy practitioners to spirometry testing and provide strategies for integrating this "value-added" tool with other direct patient care pharmacy services.
  
  
  METHODS
  Spirometry literature and resources obtained through search strategies including Ovid, PubMed, and Google Scholar.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Pharmacists are distinctive members of the multidisciplinary patient care team and can contribute by performing spirometry services for pulmonary patients. Pharmacists have been largely absent from performing this much needed service, perhaps as a result of lack of training or because this testing may be perceived as irrelevant to the pharmacist scope of practice. However, pharmacists are actively integrated with many aspects of pulmonary patient care, including recommending and adjusting inhaled pharmacological agents, monitoring for potential drug-drug and drug-disease interactions, recommending smoking cessation, assessing patient prescription insurance coverage, and educating patients, caregivers, and health care providers on use of prescribed respiratory delivery devices. Adding quality spirometry services, based on American Thoracic Society guidelines for accuracy, would increase the breadth and depth of services for pharmacy practitioners.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Spirometry testing is an added tool for expanding direct patient care pharmacy services. Physician support, appropriate pharmacist training, and understanding of reimbursement of spirometry services are essential in providing quality spirometry testing. Future studies are needed to assess the role of pharmacists in performing spirometry and measuring the performance outcomes of pulmonary patients.
authors.affiliation: Philadelphia College of Pharmacy, University of the Sciences, 600 South 43rd St., Philadelphia, PA 19104-4495, USA. m.cawley@usciences.edu
authors.forename: Michael J
authors.initials: MJ
authors.lastname: Cawley
authors.forename: Jean
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Moon
authors.forename: Jennifer
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Reinhold
authors.forename: Vincent J
authors.initials: VJ
authors.lastname: Willey
authors.forename: William J
authors.initials: WJ
authors.lastname: Warning Ii
mesh_terms: D006801:Humans; D008171:Lung Diseases / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000188:drug therapy; D017063:Outcome Assessment, Health Care; D005791:Patient Care / Q000191:economics / Q000379:methods*; D010348:Patient Care Team / Q000191:economics / Q000458:organization & administration; D010593:Pharmaceutical Services / Q000191:economics / Q000458:organization & administration*; D010595:Pharmacists / Q000191:economics / Q000458:organization & administration*; D017410:Practice Guidelines as Topic; D024382:Professional Role; D012051:Reimbursement Mechanisms; D013147:Spirometry / Q000379:methods