A chat with Sadaf Faisal: CPhA's new chief pharmacist officer on the profession's evolving role

Last month, the Canadian Pharmacists Association named Sadaf Faisal as chief pharmacist officer. A pharmacist with experience in community practice, long-term care, primary care and research, Faisal says she wants to ensure pharmacists have a stronger voice in healthcare decision-making.Canadian Healthcare Network associate editor Xavi Richer Vis recently sat down with Faisal to ask her about the profession's evolving role, the challenges pharmacists face and her priorities in the new position. Xavi Richer Vis: Tell me a little about how you came to become a pharmacist. Sadaf Faisal: Sure! So I’ve been a pharmacist for about 20 years now, working in a lot of practice settings over the years. I am an Ontario-licensed pharmacist, but not a Canadian graduate. I did my bachelor's in pharmacy in Pakistan and then moved to Ontario, going through the licensing process and starting to practise as a pharmacist.XRV: Nice! And where did that lead you? SF: Since then, I have worked in community pharmacy, long-term care and family health teams. I have owned and operated a small independent pharmacy as well. Then I actually went back to school and did my PhD from the University of Waterloo, getting some research experience before ending up at CPhA.XRV: What pulled you from the front lines into policy and advocacy?SF: I felt that there was an opportunity to bring my frontline experience and real knowledge of what goes on in practice to conversations being had about pharmacist integration, workforce issues related to burnout and expansion of scope of practice for pharmacists. I felt that it was time for me to take all the knowledge that I acquired over the years in all those practice settings and apply it to places where decisions are actually being made in terms of policy.XRV: What were you seeing on the ground that convinced you pharmacists needed a stronger voice in those conversations?SF: I felt there was a more significant role that pharmacists can play in primary care, especially given the healthcare system burden that we are experiencing. I have myself sat in an emergency room for 12 hours so I could have a prescription for a UTI. Pharmacies on the other hand are very accessible. We see patients coming to pharmacies at all times when doctors' offices are closed. Plus we have the education knowledge to properly support primary care.XRV: You've been practising for two decades. How has the role of pharmacists changed in that time? SF: When I got my licence in 2006, the main responsibilities that pharmacists were involved in were very much pure dispensing. Yes, there was medication counseling. Yes, there was over-the-counter advice. But pharmacists were not very much involved in medication reviews. They were not involved in creating care plans for patients. When I started in family health teams, pharmacists were also not as well integrated in those settings. But now I see pharmacists as an integral part of memory clinics. They are an integral part of chronic pain clinics. They are not just doing smoking cessation counseling. They are actually doing chronic disease management with their patients, whether it's diabetes or asthma.The role has significantly changed, and I feel like it will continue to evolve and continue to change.XRV: Expansion of scope and burnout are definitely top of mind for pharmacists right now, especially in Ontario and Saskatchewan, where we've recently seen new scope announcements.SF: Definitely. Workplace well-being and burnout was something that CPhA picked up on a few years ago, COVID was a real catalyst for that.We often have conversations across the profession, and did a lot of work to help raise awareness and support pharmacists. We had a pharmacy workforce wellness initiative that really focused on that specific piece of work. We also did surveys and tried to build important workforce data so that workforce planning discussions happening at the system level could better understand the pressures pharmacists are facing across the country.XRV: How is CPhA working to tackle those issues? SF: We’re primarily focusing on the administrative burden that pharmacists are facing, particularly advocacy related to third-party payers, the Competition Bureau complaint regarding Express Scripts Canada, and continuing to push for greater oversight and regulation of practices that are impacting the relationships with PBMs and insurers.Corporate pressure is another important one, and we are really supportive of the fact that pharmacists should have the autonomy to assess their practice and provide patient services based on what they feel is doable and what they feel is not risking the safety of patients.XRV: What do you see as being your job as CPO? SF: As CPO, my role is very much as a senior clinical and practice advisor, representing the profession at different tables, including government, partners, media and health system stakeholders.I’m focused on how we can connect evolving pharmacy practice with broader health system priorities: access, sustainability and support for pharmacists.A major priority for the CPO role is also to ensure that pharmacists are represented in conversations that are happening about primary care transformation, health system planning and access to care at the national level.XRV: One of the challenges in Canadian pharmacy is that a patient's access to care can look very different depending on their postal code. How do you advocate for the profession nationally when the reality on the ground varies so much from province to province?SF: That is a challenge for sure. But overall, we really want to change the concept that care is related to postal code.Pharmacists practising in Alberta compared to pharmacists practising in Ontario can have very different scopes, and that's where it really can make a difference. If we have a streamlined scope of practice all across Canada, it will not only help advocacy and policy discussions on a national level, but also at the provincial level.XRV: What would success look like to you?SF: Our aim is to increase awareness among Canadians so they can better understand the role pharmacists are playing and how that care can be impacted.Our aim is that this can really push governments and policymakers to see an opportunity to streamline the scope of practice for pharmacists.It should not be based on where you live. It should be based on what pharmacists can do, whether they are living in a province that is allowing them to prescribe or offer some services compared to a province that is not allowing them to do those services.XRV: Is there anything in particular you're hoping to accomplish in the role?SF: As CPO, my approach is very focused on helping Canadians and decision-makers better understand how pharmacy practice has evolved and how pharmacists are playing a very important role within primary care and frontline patient care delivery.My focus in this role is to help ensure that pharmacists are fully recognized, fully supported and fully integrated as essential care providers within the healthcare system.At the same time, I also want to ensure that our profession's voice is represented in conversations around bigger tables—the tables where health system planning is happening, the tables where discussions of access to care are happening and the tables where the future of primary care in Canada is being discussed.This interview was edited for length and clarity.

A chat with Sadaf Faisal: CPhA's new chief pharmacist officer on the profession's evolving role

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