THE ROLE OF THE CLINICAL PHARMACIST IN PEDIATRIC CARE: A COMPREHENSIVE REVIEW

Pediatric care undoubtedly represents one of the most complex and sophisticated fields in modern-day clinical pharmacy practice.^[1,25] Being a young patient implies numerous physiological and pharmacological differences which can have a significant impact on proper drug choice, dosage, and form.^[3,4] Clinical pharmacists working with pediatric teams are patient safety experts who are involved at every stage of the medicines use process from dose selection and management to therapy monitoring and adverse effects identification.^[1,12] The present paper gives a concise overview of current scientific evidence to highlight the important aspects of the clinical pharmacist's work within pediatric departments including roles and responsibilities, problems associated with pediatric pharmacology, and the positive influence of pharmacists' work on treatment results. It should be noted that scientific data proves that providing clinical pharmacist services to pediatric patients significantly decreases the number of medication-related mistakes, lowers hospitalization periods, promotes rational use of antibiotics, and positively affects the satisfaction of patients' families.^[1,6,7] Thus, enhancing pharmacists' work in pediatric health care is crucial for further improvement of medicines use in this field.^[18,21]

Keywords: clinical pharmacist, pediatric pharmacy, medication safety, pharmacokinetics in children, antimicrobial stewardship, therapeutic drug monitoring, neonatal pharmacy, multidisciplinary care