The MMS is a professional association of over 25,000 physicians, residents, and medical students across all clinical disciplines, organizations, and practice settings. The Medical Society is committed to advocating on behalf of patients for a better health care system, and on behalf of physicians, to help them to provide the best care possible. The Massachusetts Medical Society (MMS) wishes to be recorded in support of House bill 2134 and Senate bill 1385, An Act Relative to collaborative drug therapy management optimization, a commonsense adjustment to the pharmacist collaborative care framework to allow for virtual supervision and consultation.
MMS strongly supports the role of the pharmacist in the clinical care team to improve patient experience and health outcomes. The collaborative care model has been a successful framework to encourage an even more active pharmacist role. This has been critical to care provided in areas such as mental health and substance use disorder, chronic disease management, and beyond. MMS supports the existing framework, which encourages a collaborative relationship between the pharmacist and a physician. When this law passed, the current utilization and sophistication of telehealth and e-consultation and supervision was not contemplated. MMS thus supports this commonsense update to clarify that the modality of supervision should be flexible, at the professional discretion of the physician and pharmacist, and not confined to “on-site” arrangements.
Thank you for your consideration, the Medical Society respectfully urges a favorable report on H. 2134/S. 1385.
View a PDF version of this testimony here.
