Posted: April 28th, 2015

Write a article for the Australian Journal of Pharmacy in the area of primary professional or health focus.

Write a article for the Australian Journal of Pharmacy in the area of primary professional or health focus.
As a professional pharmacist you are expected to continue learning. Part of this process is to identify areas which need further development and outline a plan to address these areas. Your task is to identify, by reflection, a diseas states where your skills and knowledge need further development, particularly in the area of pharmacotherapeutics. You need to outline and implement a study plan to build upon these areas. You will also need to indicate how your research meets your needs in this area. You may do this by addressing questions or by using headings which you have defined. However, don’t feel restricted by either of these frameworks. Complementary and alternative medicines may be covered but only as a supplement to Western based pharmacotherapeutics.
Areas you must include:
?    Medication management
?    Management of an alternate scenarios (eg. Pregnancy, breast feeding, comorbidities, children, elderly, liver or kidney failure)
Other subtopics which you might like to consider to create the rest of the article
?    Disease state (pathophysiology)
?    Aetiology and risk factors
?    Diagnosis
?    Symptoms (common, red flags, atypical)
?    Management (lifestyle, programs, interdisciplinary)
?    Case studies
?    Useful resources (eg. links to support sites)
Rationale
Pharmacists need to be able to take a holistic approach to health care. Although you acquire knowledge and develop specific skills in different subjects you will need to use them all together as a pharmacist.
Marking criteria
Criterion    Weight    HD    DI    CR    PS    FL
Integration: Other relevant topics will be considered
1)    Physiology
2)    Pathophysiology
3)    Nutrition
4)    Pharmacology
5)    Pharmacokinetics
6)    Pharmacy practice    7 %    Relevant information from at least 5 areas is included
Relevant information from at least 4 areas is included
Relevant information from at least 3 areas is included
Relevant information from at least 2 areas is included
Portfolio only includes pharmacotherapy

Content
1)    Standard order of treatment is listed
2)    Order of treatment is justified
3)    QUM is reviewed for at least one comorbidity
4)    QUM is reviewed for at least one altered clinical state
5)    Identifies potential future changes to guidelines
6)    Describes non-pharmacological therapy of disease state
7)    Useful resource links for the pharmacist are listed
8)  At least 4 key points included    25 %    Standards 1 & 2 are completed along with 4 other standards

Standards 1 & 2 are completed along with 3 other standards

Standards 1 & 2 are completed along with 2 other standards

Standards 1 & 2 are completed

Pharmacotherapy for disease state is not included

Sources of evidence
1)    Textbooks
2)    Summary reference text (eg. APF, AMH)
3)    Special interest groups
4)    Reviewed journal articles
5)    Primary journal articles
6)    Meta-analysis/systemic reviews    5 %    At least 3 different source types are used with type 5 & 6 predominating
At least 3 different source types are used with type 4 & 5 predominating

Sources 1 to 3 predominately used

Sources 1 to 2 predominately used

Only sources 1 and 2 are used

Reflection
1)    Topic is identified and justified in pre-reflection, including triggers & evidence.
2)    Specific aspects of the disease are identified as learning outcomes
3)    Post reflection addresses learning process
4)    Post reflection addresses time management
5)    Post reflection addresses goal achievement
6)    Reflection suggests ways to improve    8 %    Standards 1 & 2 are completed along with 3 other standards

Standards 1 & 2 are completed along with 2 other standards

Standards 1 & 2 are completed along with 1 other standard

Standard 1 & 2 are completed
No reflection is submitted or it does not identify or justify topic area selection

Plan
1)    Allocates time for completing this assessment task
2)    Addresses other assessment tasks
3)    Includes visual map of time requirement (eg. GANTT)
4)    Identifies search keywords, databases or other sources of information
5)    Tracks progress
5 %    Standards 1 to 2 are completed along with 2 other standards
Standards 1 to 2 are completed along with 1 other standards

Standards 1 to 2 are completed
Standard 1 is completed
No plan is submitted

Quality Multipliers (x2)*    Weight    HD    DI    CR    PS    FL
Referencing
1)    References listed
2)    In-text citations used correctly
3)    Figures and tables referenced
4)    Books referenced correctly
5)    Lectures referenced correctly
6)    Journals referenced correctly
7)    Website referenced correctly
8)    e-books referenced correctly    25 %    All standards applied where appropriate

At least 4 types of references formatted according to APA standards and standards 1 to 3 applied

At least 3 types of references formatted consistently to APA standards and standard 1 & 2 applied

At least 2 types of references formatted consistently to APA standards and Standard 1 & 2 applied

References do not exist and/or do not follow APA standard

Presentation
1)    Learning outcomes identified for article
2)    Figures labelled with figure legends and referred to in text
3)    Tables labelled with figure legends and referred to in text
4)    Headings are used throughout    25 %    All 4 standards are applied
At least 3 standards are applied
At least 2 standards are applied
At least 1 standard is applied
No standards are applied

Written Communication
1)    Spelling errors are not noticeable
2)    Grammatical errors are not noticeable
3)    Sentences are constructed correctly
4)    Paragraphs are constructed correctly
5)    Argument and information flow is supportive and progressive
6)    Information from multiple sources is synthesised
7) Word count is within 1 % of limit.    50 %    All standards are applied    Standard 1 &2 are applied and at least 2 others
Standard 1 is applied and at least 1 other
Standard 1 is applied

Portfolio is difficult to read or lines of thought or arguments are difficult to follow or word count exceeds limit by 10%.

Disease state multiplier+         1x    1.05x    1.1x
Osteoarthritis
Osteoporosis
Gout
Dyslipidaemia
Asthma
COPD
LUTS
Glaucoma
Alzheimer’s disease
Sleep disorders (but not insomnia)
Headaches
Eye infections
Skin disorders
Respiratory infections
Thyroid disorders
Parathyroid disorders
Diabetes (IDDM)    MS
Depression
Stroke
Thrombosis
Arrhythmias
Heart failure
Parkinson’s disease
Inflammatory Bowel Disease
Tuberculosis
Hepatitis
Bipolar disorder
Coronary Artery Disease
Anxiety
ACS
Cystic Fibrosis
Rheumatoid Arthritis
Schizophrenia
Oncology
Epilepsy
HIV
Diabetes (NIDDM)
+ Multipliers are marks which multiple your mark from the upper section. PS level >1 and HD=2.
* Disease multipliers are based on disease and pharmacotherapeutic complexity.
The main content is worth 50% and can multiplied by up to 2 based on the quality of the work and up to 1.1 if the disease state you select was assessed as complicated. However, the maximum mark is capped at 100 %.
Presentation
This task should be submitted as a document.
Article length: 3,000 words (references not included in count)
If submitted as a document then
?    font size: 12 point
?    line spacing: maximum of 1.5
?
Key points
?    4-5 key points (Max: 50 words/point)
?
Milestone dates
?    May 31st: Submit

‘’ The reflection part is separate and is due anytime before the end of May
So basically I am not in any hurry to receive it and I would like to give the writer plenty of more time as I know this could be time consuming.
Topics of specialisation could be anything; eg. Asthma, Hypertension, Diabetics, Obesity and/or high cholesterol level, DVT, thyroid hyper or hypo – the writer could choose anything he may be more familiar or comfortable with.
And I would like to keep this in mind please… if possible…
x 1.1 if the disease state you select was assessed as complicated… for example thise people taking warfarin for blood thinning since warfarin is interacting with many medication ‘’

Reflection
?    Max word count: 1000 words
?    Include an identification of current strengths, weaknesses, areas of interest or areas you would like to specialisation in as a pharmacist. Your placements will give you some good ideas help and you are allowed to ask the people you work with for ideas about useful topics they would like to read about.
?    You can use the professional competency standards as a guide. (1.7.7, 1.8 & domain 7) – http://www.psa.org.au/download/standards/competency-standards-complete.pdf

?    Outline a plan to research the top identified area
?    This article should help guide you and other readers in making decisions regarding the quality use of medicines.
?    You can also consider common complications which may affect:
?    pharmacokinetics: eg. pregnancy, breastfeeding, children or the elderly.
?    pharmacotherapeutics eg. diabetes and hypertension or smoking and COPD
?    Remember you can use tables and illustrations to help the reader through your article.

Plan
Your plan should:
?    Identify the topic (disease state) you will be covering
?    Identify any specific fields (specific patient populations, eg. paediatrics, geriatrics, pregnancy) you will focus on.  — > I have pregnancy in mind but if the write is more comfortable with other area I am cool.
Content
?    Use the Australian Journal of Pharmacy as your exemplar.
?    Must be useful to enhance the quality use of medication in the practice of pharmacy.
?    Expand on it to include changes in the order of treatment, which might occur in: pregnancy, breastfeeding, renal or hepatic failure or common co-morbidities.
?    Make a table or flow chart if there are specific characteristics of the drugs used to treat the disease that can be used to help make choices in a patient’s treatment.
Make sure you use information from other subjects, so that you can take a holistic approach when working with patients

Requirements
Submit as a document in Word format, RTF or PDF.
Referencing should be in APA style.