Rome - Physiotherapists and pharmacists join hands to offer citizens a new model of community healthcare. This is how an innovative trial is born, involving the Lazio Order of Physiotherapists (OFI Lazio), the Order of Pharmacists of Rome, Federfarma Roma, and Assofarm Lazio. The goal is to bring rehabilitation services into pharmacies, which are increasingly becoming multifunctional health facilities in the region.
The project, starting in the Metropolitan City of Roma, with the prospect of extending throughout the Lazio region, provides for the presence of a physiotherapist in dedicated rooms within participating pharmacies.
Here, the professional will offer consultations, assessments, and initial therapeutic guidance, directing clients, depending on their circumstances, to private practices or public rehabilitation services.
The agreement was announced in Rome during the second regional congress of OFI Lazio with the symbolic signatures of the president of the Order of Physiotherapists of Lazio, Annamaria Servadio, the president of the Order of Pharmacists of Rome, Giuseppe Guaglianone, the president of Federfarma Rome, Andrea Cicconetti, and the coordinator of Assofarm Lazio, Enrico Cellentani.
"I believe," Annamaria Servadio, president of the Lazio Order of Physiotherapists, explained to the Dire news agency, "that the agreement between physiotherapists and pharmacists is crucial at this historic moment for the redesign of the regional network.
This agreement saw the work of this Order in conjunction with the Order of Pharmacists of Rome as the primary interlocutor. The work began last year at the first regional conference of OFI Lazio, and the agreement was the mandate of the last congress.
"The agreement with pharmacists," Servadio continued, "is extremely important because it effectively reshapes the role of the physiotherapist within the local network and within pharmacies. The regulations governing service pharmacies date back over ten years, but today they view the role of the physiotherapist in an innovative way, reflecting the evolving healthcare landscape, in which pharmacies are key players."
"Therefore," emphasized the president of OFI Lazio, "thanks to this agreement, we are designing a new look for physiotherapists in an area where pharmacies undoubtedly play a key role."
Alongside the local health authorities, the agreement also involves the Lazio Region, integrating this initiative into broader regional healthcare planning.
The protocol aims to create a local system, including one that addresses the need for rehabilitation, by offering residents who visit the pharmacy the expertise of a physiotherapist for counseling and therapeutic approaches, by directing rehabilitation needs, depending on their complexity, to the general practitioner, specialist, or rehabilitation facilities designated by the Health Authority, by enhancing the physiotherapist's management skills during the self-care phase of rehabilitation and maintenance programs verified and guided by the physiotherapist, by creating a local network of pharmacies, pharmacists, and independent physiotherapists, and, finally, by promoting, including with other healthcare professionals, citizen empowerment initiatives through health education programs, particularly on lifestyle and chronic or chronically ill conditions.
"The agreement between pharmacists and physiotherapists," said Giuseppe Guaglianone, president of the Order of Pharmacists of Rome, "is born from a deeply shared belief between the two professions: the strategic goal of improving local healthcare can only be achieved within a framework of organic and structured interprofessional collaboration among healthcare professionals working in the community.
Healthcare services for citizens can improve, expand, and become more efficient only if each profession, respecting its own expertise, makes itself available to develop and streamline local care, thus promoting the protection of citizens' health through programs and initiatives conducted in an integrated manner with other professions and with local health authorities and institutions.
According to Guaglianone, "there is no longer a time for closed-off gardens or for seeking improbable primacy over which profession is the most important, because all professionals who care for citizens by providing various services and benefits are equally necessary and important. This is the starting point that in recent months has pushed the Orders of Pharmacists, Physicians, and Nurses of Rome to forge a 'holy alliance,' which also aims to be a 'healthy alliance,' to launch joint initiatives aimed at strengthening and improving community care, for the benefit of citizens."
"The agreement with physiotherapists," he added, "is part of this trend: the agreement with OFI Lazio, made possible by the decisive and committed support of the private and public pharmacy associations, Federfarma Roma and Assofarm, aims to improve the response to citizens in terms of health services in the rehabilitation field, through a structured collaboration between physiotherapists, pharmacies, and physiotherapists, facilitating appropriate pathways, faster response times, and proximity to care, with the involvement of the health authorities and the Lazio Region itself."
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"In other words," emphasized the president of the Order of Pharmacists of Rome, "it's about creating a local system, also addressing the need for rehabilitative healthcare, through a network of pharmacies, pharmacists, and independent physiotherapists in the area. This will offer residents who visit pharmacies the expertise of a physiotherapist for counseling and therapeutic approaches. For us, better, more efficient, and functional healthcare, and above all, truly citizen-friendly, can only come from initiatives and programs like this."
"I am very pleased with the signing of this agreement," said Federfarma Roma President Andrea Cicconetti, "because pharmacies represent a fundamental local resource for citizens, and a synergy between healthcare providers can only enrich the range of services, responding more effectively to healthcare needs.
In this case, thanks to the collaboration with physiotherapists, the opportunity finally opens up to define clear guidelines and regulate the relationship between two key professionals in the healthcare system. I truly hope this represents the beginning of a fruitful collaboration for everyone, with the primary health of citizens always at the center.
"For Assofarm Lazio, the agreement with physiotherapists, other pharmacy associations, and the Order of Pharmacists," stated Assofarm Lazio coordinator Enrico Cellentani, "is extremely important because it affirms a principle: the intervention of pharmacies as local points of supply for healthcare services, as well as strictly for the sale of medicines, is in the collective interest.
So it's not a matter of the pharmacy's interests being opposed to other categories of service providers, but rather an additional opportunity for those working in the community to have points, places where they can provide services that are increasingly closer to the needs of a population that, due to age and medical conditions, is finding it increasingly difficult to move around, wait in line, and travel across the community. This is the essential element.
"Healthcare professionals must work together to offer increasingly local services, and pharmacies are a privileged place in this regard, given their widespread presence throughout the region. In this context," Cellentani concluded, "municipal pharmacies are clearly even more so, because their presence is protected, particularly in Rome but not only, by their presence in challenging areas, where providing local healthcare is particularly important."
The agreement stipulates that the Order of Pharmacists of Rome will assume a supervisory role in the implementation and operational management of collaboration between pharmacists and physiotherapists in pharmacies, ensuring full compliance with the Code of Ethics and the professional skills of each individual.
The Order, together with OFI Lazio, will also be responsible for designing and organizing specific training courses for the professionals involved in the initiative, with the aim of ensuring high standards of quality, safety, and appropriateness in the services provided.
On the operational front, Federfarma Roma and Assofarm will be responsible for gathering applications from pharmacies interested in hosting physiotherapists. These services will be conducted in dedicated spaces, compliant with hygiene, confidentiality, and suitability requirements for assessment and rehabilitation consultations.
The same organizations will also ensure the ongoing updating of the list of participating pharmacies and offer support for any healthcare reservations requested by citizens as part of the process initiated with the physiotherapist.
OFI Lazio, for its part, will select physiotherapists operating as freelancers, who will be present in participating pharmacies to carry out counseling and initial therapeutic approach activities. The professionals will be able to direct citizens, depending on the needs that emerge, to physiotherapy studios located nearby or, in coordination with the competent ASL, to public rehabilitation services available in the area.
An organizational model will also be defined to ensure effective coordination between pharmacies and the Regional Health Service facilities, promoting an integrated and accessible care pathway.
Freelance physiotherapists registered with OFI Lazio may apply to work as counselors at only one participating pharmacy, and may only apply for their own practice to provide services at a single pharmacy located in the vicinity. The two services cannot be performed at the same pharmacy.
The agreement signed between the Order of Pharmacists of Rome, the Order of Physiotherapists of Lazio, Federfarma Roma, and Assofarm Lazio will last one year.
Comments (1)
This new agreement between pharmacists and physiotherapists is very interesting. I hope it can really improve services for citizens. Local healthcare is an important thing, but we'll see if it really works as promised.