The interprofessional committee will be meeting on September 11th to discuss editing our current protocol to include the lower age limit for flu and adding additional vaccines.
Their recommendations will be sent to the Board of Medical Examiners, who will have to vote to accept them. Until this occurs, we can still only give influenza vaccines to patients 18 and older without a prescription. Everyone else will require a prescription.
On June 2nd Governor Haley signed our immunization expansion legislation into law. This law has caused four important changes to pharmacy practice:
- An interprofessional committee will recommend which vaccines pharmacists can administer without a prescription and send their recommendations to the Board of Medical Examiners.
- Pharmacy students can administer vaccines provided they are certified and are directly supervised by an immunizing pharmacist.
- Pharmacists can administer influenza vaccines to patients at least 12 years of age and older without a prescription.
- Pharmacists can administer any vaccine to any patient, regardless of age, as long as they have a valid prescription from a patient’s provider.
SCPhA is actively following the committee’s work and we will continue to communicate updates. Until you receive an official update from the Board of Pharmacy, we recommend you continue practicing they way you did last influenza season.
Additional information can be found at www.scrx.org/immunizations