Overcoming Past Perceptions and Profession-Wide Identity Crisis to Reflect Pharmacy’s Future

Abstract

The profession of pharmacy has come to encompass a myriad of identities including apothecary, dispenser, merchandiser, expert advisor, and health care provider. While these have changed over time, the responsibilities and scope of practice have not evolved to keep up with the goals of the profession and level of education of practicing pharmacists in the United States. By assuming both the product-centric and patient-centric responsibilities for the aforementioned names, our true professional identity is unclear, which can be linked to the development and preservation of impostor phenomenon among the profession. For pharmacy to truly move forward, we need a unified definition for the profession by either letting go of past identities or separating these identities from each other through altering our standards within professional degree programs and practice models. Without substantial changes to the way we approach this challenge as a profession, the problems described will only persist and deepen.