Will pharmacists be replaced by robots in the near future?
I have been a pharmacist 25 years,spanning the era from typewriters to robotic dispensing machines. Paradoxically, it seems like the more technology that is implemented,the MORE you are in demand. Nurses,physicians,and patients get information overload and need someone with an extensive pharmaceutical background to interpret the data. I would say in the future pharmacists may do very little dispensing as you see it today- taking a script and filling it-that may be taken over 100% by robots- I would say you will in the retail setting spend a lot of time talking to patients and reviewing their meds and making sure they have a basic understanding of what they are taking and why and side effects to be aware of. In the hospital setting you will review charts,talk to patients at discharge about their meds,and do drug research and make drug recomendations for doctors, as well as following patient's progress on drug therapies,especially antibiotics and anticoagulants. I could be wrong,but that is what I see happening- and I have been doing this for a quarter century.