#Canadian Pharmacists

[pharmacybrandca]

Buildout and Fixturing | Canadian Pharmacists

Concept Pharmacy + Clinic Design believes in a very collaborative approach to design with PBC banner members that balances out creativity, workflow and regulatory needs to create a leading edge final product. They have the expertise that enables them to guide your through the process from design, project management, buildout and fixturing. Whether you are designing a new space or renovating an existing healthcare business, Concept Pharmacy + Clinic Design can support you.

[allthecanadianpolitics]

Ontario is expanding the number of conditions for which pharmacists can write prescriptions. At a news conference Sunday, Health Minister Sylvia Jones said the province has added six more common ailments to the list of conditions pharmacists can diagnose and treat, effective immediately, bringing the total to 19. [...] It's added acne, canker sores and yeast infections to the list, along with nausea and vomiting related to pregnancy, diaper rash and parasitic worms such as pinworms and threadworms.

Continue Reading.

Tagging: @politicsofcanada

[disengaged]

help girl i just paid $260 for a 30 day prescription

[eelslippers]

I know I shouldn't be complaining about my healthcare system because it is technically free but it's kind of ridiculous that on the average day every medicentre within my entire city seems to be closed and not accepting appointments and walk ins only for 2 hrs a day. It seems ridiculous that I would have an easier time waiting 14 hrs in a hospital er to see a doctor than a medicentre, which I'm not going to do because I don't need urgent care but it's still ridiculous.

[darkmaga-retard]

The article was always a hypothesized estimate of people that might have died, but now even that estimate has been retracted. The reason for the retraction was that the Belgian dataset that was one of the bases for the piece was found to be “unreliable” (but in reality was fraudulent). The article also repeatedly referenced the New England Journal of Medicine’s 2020 RECOVERY trial. The RECOVERY trial is well known to be a deeply flawed study which, in addition to implementing late treatment in severely ill Covid patients, used extremely high doses of HCQ. 

The now retracted publication authors were all French or Canadian, with the primary author a pharmacist by the name of Alexiane Pradelle. According to a rudimentary internet search, Dr. Pradelle had never published before. Subsequently, listed authors were degreed as physicians, pharmacists, and/or professors of their respective disciplines. The main, corresponding author, Jean-Christophe Lega, runs the Evaluation and Modeling of Therapeutic Effects team at the University of Lyon. 

Hydroxychloroquine’s Fabled Safety History Contrasts Data

In addition to being a hypothesized estimate, the article also attacked the legendary safety of HCQ, contradicting centuries of the safety of quinolines as a class. 

HCQ, chloroquine and quinine are structurally and pharmaceutically/mechanistically related, sharing the same quinoline structural group. The original iteration of quinine was a very fortunate discovery that dates back to the 1600s (at least) as a medicinal tipple used by Jesuit missionaries in South America. It is naturally found in the bark of the Cinchona tree (also called a “Quina-Quina” tree). 

Quinine is still available today both as a prescription drug, for similar indications as HCQ including malaria…and as a Covid-19 treatment. 

[tgfangirl4eva]

YO DIABETICS!

If you live in the US and HATE having to pay high ass prices for insulin, you MUST check out this website!

Canadian pharmacists can ship insulin for a MASSIVE reduction of the cost that you’d pay getting insulin in the US!

[aneldritchmoth]

This is not my usual content but I find it important to talk about. I've been looking through the Gaza Family Funds Directory that I found through Operation Olive Branch and I've found three families that particularly stuck with me.

🍉 GoFundMe Info : Ghada's family

Ghada Abdulfatah is a palestinian pharmacist trying to evacuate 22 members across 4 families, including 8 children (all under age 16).

Their home, was completely demolished by Israeli missiles and they have no home to go back to. Her family had to evacuate multiple times until the Isreali army requested they evacuate from the north of Gaza valley to the south with nothing to substain them. They eventually evacuated to the south where they were separated.

One of her sister and husband's home is partially destroyed, their private dental clinic was bombed. Both her parents have chronic cardiovascular diseases that require daily intake of medications and periodic physical checks and possible emergency interventions. Due to the complete collapse of the health infrastructure in the Gaza Strip, there is no medication or hospitals to welcome them if needed.

🫒 GoFundMe Info : Dina's family

Dina Aljazzar is currently in Canada while the rest of her family is still in Gaza. She currently raising funds to evacuate 14 family members, 7 adults and 7 children.

Before October 7th, her father was a successful buisnessman, her mother was a teacher with UNRWA and her siblings were university students. Her brother substained a severe head injury and after a 2 week coma, he was released from a hospital due to the lack of resources.

🍉 GoFundMe Info : Vittorio's family

Vittorio Elburai is a 12 years old Palestinian/Canadian boy raising funds to evacuate his family so they can join him safely in Canada.

He was born and raised in Gaza, where he lived happily with his entire family until his parents decided to flee after the 2021 attack on Gaza and relocated in Canada for their safety.

His 81 years old grandma endured lasting childhood trauma from her first experience with ethnic cleansing in 1948. She lives with his uncles, Mohammed and Khaled, their home is currently housing 15 families that lost their own during the Israeli bombing.

DISCLAMER : To get all the information about their situations in greater details, I strongly recommend checking out their GoFundMes. My abbrievated version of their letters will not get you the full picture of their specific situations.

[survivingcapitalism]

With the collapse of primary medicine in Ontario, a situation ensured by provincial governments for decades, Loblaws has managed to become the only game in town for one of the 2.2 million Ontarians without a family doctor. While the Ford government has ensured Shoppers can profit from pharmacists “treating” minor ailments, if you need a family doctor and don’t have a walk-in nearby, you get Maple. 

Last spring, Galen and company delivered the coup de grace, in terms of making sure they are unavoidable in primary care, with the purchase of Lifemark Health Group. By paying Audax Private Equity $845 million, Galen acquired Canada’s leading provider of physio, massage therapy, chiropractic, mental health and rehab services. Interestingly, given the significance of the purchase for Canadians, as patients, media coverage of the acquisition was muted. 

[softlittleheartsandsparkles]

what do you mean by wait time? I thought you were canadian? Don't you guys have free healthcare?

So, unfortunately in canada, Free healthcare doesn't mean "timely" health care, or getting whatever care whenever you want it. Its sadly not like poppin' in for a hair cut, or showing up for dental work. (dental is private still. I'm fairly sure. ) Like health care in canada is very very VERY backed up. It was like that prior to covid but it covid defs I feel like exhausted existing gaps. Like in BC - because I lived there for awhile, and I feel comfortable speaking about BC. there's areas were people don't have access to GPS/family drs and no walkins. (Or didn't in 2022) Like Canada also has health care deserts. Interior of BC is like that. (Outside of the vancouver/greater vancouver area. Anything outside of there, its very spotty depending on areas.) Which means too people sadly have to go to hospitals. (And this sucks because people need prescriptions.) Like it wasn't uncommon to see questioned posed on fb groups aimed for the city I lived in for 9ish months. About does that city have a walk-in/gp/family dr. And are waitlists being taken, etc. I heard this question even at a pharmacy, a lady came in with her small child, who had what she believed is a ear infection& wanted drops. She was told they can't give drops, she needs a prescription. So she asked are there clinics in the area? She was told there's no clinics local - and she'd have to take her wee one to the hospital. This is the same message fb groups would have. No clinicals locally, hospital. I couldn't even get breast imaging done in that town. you can't self referral. You need a gp/family dr/ walk in to give you the paperwork/do referral. ^^;' Which is one of the things I had to wait for. Until I moved again, to Alberta. & in alberta, my GP isn't close to me. He's almost 2 hours away. But he was also the only one accepting patients when we moved. And this is closer than my previously dr in bc. I do see some work towards offering more options that are in person. (everyone constantly pushes people to telus and there telehealth. Telus is a phone/internet/cable company. For americans this would be like AT&T getting into the health market.) I've noticed pharmacys now can write scripts for mild health issues, or for things like diabetes. (YAY) I do see some family drs opening up now, collecting lists of patients, and some walkins. (also some walkins are ran by pharmacists, so they are again for "mild" causes. Like probably could go in with a rash from your squashes and be like 'this itchy, i touched squash leafs' pharmacist be like 'new to gardening huh? alright well uh. here." - Squash leafs can cause rashes. just so folks know lol. ) But yeah. I also don't think this is all of canada. I can only speak about what I see locally. But health care in canada is extremely backed up, and depending on service and severity medical professionals believe you are, (I.e. they believe your moderate/mild vs severe) you could be waiting. I've been waiting on my referral since March this year. Even with the rectum bleeding i'm still counted as "mild/moderate". & I won't be able to "see" my specialist until late sept. (And what I mean by "see" I mean, we have a phone call aptoment scheduled... from there hopefully I get referral for colonoscopy, and for follow up that can be in person. but I honestly don't know.)

[allthecanadianpolitics]

Ontario is planning to allow pharmacists to prescribe flu medication, administer flu shots to babies and administer RSV vaccines, when available, ahead of an expected fall viral surge.

The Ministry of Health is asking for feedback on new draft regulations from the Ontario College of Pharmacists, but with a short two-week comment period as the respiratory virus season looms.

Full article

Tagging: @politicsofcanada

[wisdomfish]

Do Not Be Discouraged, Jesus Builds His Church

In the late 1800s a Canadian pharmacist, Dr. William Leslie, sensed God calling him to use his medical skills to advance the gospel on the continent of Africa. He set out for the Democratic Republic of the Congo in 1895, joining the missions organization first pioneered by the famed Adoniram Judson in Burma. After a few years, Dr. Leslie met and married another missionary, and together they served in the DRC—offering medical treatment and the gospel.

In 1912, wanting to take the gospel to more remote indigenous people groups, the Leslies began to clear away dense—and reportedly leopard-infested—jungle along the Kwilu River to build the Vanga mission station. Some of the villages surrounding Vanga were still practicing cannibalism at that time. Clearing the jungle took immense effort and some time, but finally the Leslies built a home and a medical outpost along the river. They spent 17 years there, regularly setting out across the river from their station to offer both medical help and the gospel in a spiritually dark place.

It’s not totally clear what happened, but records show that after 17 years Dr. Leslie and his wife were asked by local tribal leaders to leave. There had been some kind of falling out and they were no longer welcome in or around Vanga. The Leslies abandoned their mission outpost and returned to the U.S. defeated—believing they had failed. They weren’t aware of any converts and certainly did not witness the planting of any churches. Dr. Leslie died nine years after his return, thinking his efforts in the DRC were in vain.

We’ll fast forward 100 years from where we left off with his story.

In 2010, a short-term mission team set out for the Vanga mission station. They did a little preliminary research and expected to find the tribal groups near there yet unreached.

They flew into Kinshasa on a commercial airplane. Then they took a Cessna, operated by Mission Aviation Fellowship, two and half hours to Vanga. They hiked a mile through the jungle to the Kwilu River and then used dug-out canoes to cross the half-mile wide river, to finally arrive at the mission station. The team then backpacked 10 miles further into the jungle before coming into contact with the Yansi, the same tribe that the Leslies had ministered to a whole century before.

The team leader from that 2010 expedition reports, “When we got in there, we found a network of reproducing churches throughout the jungle. Each village had its own gospel choir, although they wouldn’t call it that. They wrote their own songs and would have sing-offs from village to village.”

The team found a church in each of the eight villages they visited, scattered across 34 miles. They even found a 1000-seat stone “cathedral” in one of the villages. They were told that church got so crowded in the 1980s – with many walking miles to attend — that a church planting movement began in the surrounding areas.

They did some investigating and interviewing and discovered that the spiritual roots of this network of jungle churches went back to Dr. Leslie and his wife. The Leslies left the mission field dejected and discouraged, believing they had failed. Dr. Leslie died believing his work had been fruitless. But one hundred years later, the evidence says otherwise.

In Vanga and the surrounding villages, Jesus built his church. In spite of these missionaries’ perceived failure, even in spite of rejection and relational fallout, Jesus built his church.

~ Jen Oshman

[queen-street-news]

New Post has been published on https://bloornews.com/blog-toronto/bc-company-granted-permission-by-health-canada-to-produce-and-sell-cocaine/

BC Company Granted Permission by Health Canada to Produce and Sell Cocaine

A British Columbia cannabis company says it has received approval from Health Canada to produce, sell, and distribute cocaine.

A woman (L) prepares to inject herself with an unknown substance as a man sits in a wheelchair outside Insite, the supervised consumption site, in the Downtown Eastside of Vancouver, B.C., on Feb. 21, 2017. (The Canadian Press/Darryl Dyck

In a news release on Feb. 22, Adastra Holdings Ltd., which produces marijuana for adult use and medical sales out of headquarters in Langley, B.C., announced that it was granted a Health Canada amendment to its Controlled Drug and Substances Dealer’s License on Feb. 17.

The company can now “legally possess, produce, sell and distribute” cocaine, in addition to previously being allowed to deal up to 1,000 grams of psilocybin and psilocin, otherwise known as magic mushrooms.

The news release indicates Adastra can “interact with up to 250 grams” of cocaine, and can import coca leaves to manufacture and synthesize the hard drug in Canada.

Adastra’s Health Canada approval follows a federal government approval for B.C. that, as of Jan. 31, granted the province a temporary three-year exemption to allow adults to legally possess up to 2.5 grams of any combination of opioids, cocaine, methamphetamine, MDMA, heroin, fentanyl, and/or morphine for personal use, at no risk of being arrested, charged, or having their drugs seized.

The CEO of Adastra, Michael Forbes, is a pharmacist who formerly worked in multiple methadone pharmacies, according to the company, and is a proponent of “harm reduction,” which is a philosophy that promotes reducing negative consequences associated with drug use, but without requiring abstinence from drugs or addiction treatment.

Adastra’s release says he previously “piloted a needle exchange program” at the direction of the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention in 2010. Forbes is the creator of the Forbes Group, which has multiple companies ranging from moving storage, cannabis, health care services, and advertising.

The federal government has been supportive of the B.C. decriminalization plan, with federal Mental Health and Addictions Minister Carolyn Bennett saying on Jan. 30 that it will reduce “the stigma, the fear, and shame that keep people who use drugs silent about their use, or using alone.”

Conservatives have been critical of the plan, with leader Pierre Poilievre saying B.C.’s approach to the issue has been an “abject failure.”

“Decriminalization has been in place in B.C. now since about 2017 in reality,” he said on Feb. 1. “The results are in. The debate is over. It has been a disaster, an absolute abject failure.”

By Marnie Cathcart

[darkmaga-retard]

It wasn’t “unreliable data”, it was outright and intentional fraud: the data NEVER existed in the first place. How many times have we been punked by criminal scientists? First, it was Covid itself. Then, it was HCQ. Then Ivermectin. Then, remdesivir (killed tens of thousands). Then, fraudulent hospital protocols that killed tens of thousands. This is a war against humanity perpetrated by monsters who are individually guilty of crimes against humanity. ⁃ Patrick Wood, TN Editor.

Early January of 2024, Americans learned about the publication of an article from Elsevier’s Journal of Biomedicine and Pharmacotherapy overseen by Dr. Danyelle Townsend, a professor at the University of South Carolina College of Pharmacy’s Department of Drug Discovery and Biomedical Sciences. As Editor-in-Chief, Dr. Townsend reviewed, approved, and published the article titled: “Deaths induced by compassionate use of hydroxychloroquine during the first COVID-19 wave: An estimate.”

The article was always a hypothesized estimate of people that might have died, but now even that estimate has been retracted. The reason for the retraction was that the Belgian dataset that was one of the bases for the piece was found to be “unreliable” (but in reality was fraudulent). The article also repeatedly referenced the New England Journal of Medicine’s 2020 RECOVERY trial. The RECOVERY trial is well known to be a deeply flawed study which, in addition to implementing late treatment in severely ill Covid patients, used extremely high doses of HCQ.

The now retracted publication authors were all French or Canadian, with the primary author a pharmacist by the name of Alexiane Pradelle. According to a rudimentary internet search, Dr. Pradelle had never published before. Subsequently, listed authors were degreed as physicians, pharmacists, and/or professors of their respective disciplines. The main, corresponding author, Jean-Christophe Lega, runs the Evaluation and Modeling of Therapeutic Effects team at the University of Lyon.

Hydroxychloroquine’s Fabled Safety History Contrasts Data

In addition to being a hypothesized estimate, the article also attacked the legendary safety of HCQ, contradicting centuries of the safety of quinolines as a class.

HCQ, chloroquine and quinine are structurally and pharmaceutically/mechanistically related, sharing the same quinoline structural group. The original iteration of quinine was a very fortunate discovery that dates back to the 1600s (at least) as a medicinal tipple used by Jesuit missionaries in South America. It is naturally found in the bark of the Cinchona tree (also called a “Quina-Quina” tree).

Quinine is still available today both as a prescription drug, for similar indications as HCQ including malaria…and as a Covid-19 treatment.

Quinine is so safe that it may be unique in that the FDA simultaneously permits its use without a prescription, as an ingredient in tonic waters.

[thetragicallynerdy]

If you don't have drug benefits, or your drugs aren't fully covered, always always ask your doctor for the cheapest possible option for your medication. It won't always be possible - some meds are expensive, and don't have cheaper alternatives that work as well - but for things like antibiotics, there's often a cheaper alternative that will still work.

And if your doctor is on board, but isn't sure how much things cost - ask your pharmacist. If you pick up the medication and it's really expensive, ask them if there's a cheaper alternative that might work. Every pharmacist I've asked about stuff like this has been extremely willing to do a bit of research and give me some other options, which I then take back to my doctor.

For example - today I was prescribed antibiotics for an ear infection that cost $75. I asked the pharmacist for an alternative, called my doctor's office, and she faxed down a new script. The new one is an older antibiotic, and cost me $14. I had asked her in office about the cost of the first medication, she hadn't known, but had agreed that I could call back and request something else.

Now, my doctor's office is very good with doing that sort of thing - not everyone's will be, but it's always always worth the ask. I've done this with a pain medication we were trying as well, as well as other types of medications in the past. Most doctors and pharmacists understand that people can't always afford medications, but most doctors rarely think of the cost of meds unless you ask them first.

(Worth noting as well that I'm Canadian, so I've got no idea how well this would work in other counties. But it doesn't hurt to try.)

[nwdsc]

(Blue Rev | Alvvaysから)

Blue Rev by Alvvays

Alvvays never intended to take five years to finish their third album, the nervy joyride that is the compulsively lovable Blue Rev. In fact, the band began writing and cutting its first bits soon after releasing 2017’s Antisocialites, that stunning sophomore record that confirmed the Toronto quintet’s status atop a new generation of winning and whip-smart indie rock. Global lockdowns notwithstanding, circumstances both ordinary and entirely unpredictable stunted those sessions. Alvvays toured more than expected, a surefire interruption for a band that doesn’t write on the road. A watchful thief then broke into singer Molly Rankin’s apartment and swiped a recorder full of demos, one day before a basement flood nearly ruined all the band’s gear. They subsequently lost a rhythm section and, due to border closures, couldn’t rehearse for months with their masterful new one, drummer Sheridan Riley and bassist Abbey Blackwell. At least the five-year wait was worthwhile: Blue Rev doesn’t simply reassert what’s always been great about Alvvays but instead reimagines it. They have, in part and sum, never been better. There are 14 songs on Blue Rev, making it not only the longest Alvvays album but also the most harmonically rich and lyrically provocative. There are newly aggressive moments here—the gleeful and snarling guitar solo at the heart of opener “Pharmacist,” or the explosive cacophony near the middle of “Many Mirrors.” And there are some purely beautiful spans, too—the church- organ fantasia of “Fourth Figure,” or the blue-skies bridge of “Belinda Says.” But the power and magic of Blue Rev stems from Alvvays’ ability to bridge ostensible binaries, to fuse elements that seem antithetical in single songs—cynicism and empathy, anger and play, clatter and melody, the soft and the steely. The luminous poser kiss-off of “Velveteen,” the lovelorn confusion of “Tile by Tile,” the panicked but somehow reassuring rush of “After the Earthquake”. The songs of Blue Rev thrive on immediacy and intricacy, so good on first listen that the subsequent spins where you hear all the details are an inevitability. This perfectly dovetailed sound stems from an unorthodox—and, for Alvvays, wholly surprising—recording process, unlike anything they’ve ever done. Alvvays are fans of fastidious demos, making maps of new tunes so complete they might as well have topographical contour lines. But in October 2021, when they arrived at a Los Angeles studio with fellow Canadian Shawn Everett, he urged them to forget the careful planning they’d done and just play the stuff, straight to tape. On the second day, they ripped through Blue Rev front-to-back twice, pausing only 15 seconds between songs and only 30 minutes between full album takes. And then, as Everett has done on recent albums by The War on Drugs and Kacey Musgraves, he spent an obsessive amount of time alongside Alvvays filling in the cracks, roughing up the surfaces, and mixing the results. This hybridized approach allowed the band to harness each song’s absolute core, then grace it with texture and depth. Notice the way, for instance, that “Tom Verlaine” bursts into a jittery jangle; then marvel at the drums and drum machines ricocheting off one another, the harmonies that crisscross, and the stacks of guitar that rise between riff and hiss, subtle but essential layers that reveal themselves in time. Every element of Alvvays leveled up in the long interim between albums: Riley is a classic dynamo of a drummer, with the power of a rock deity and the finesse of a jazz pedigree. Their roommate, in-demand bassist Blackwell, finds the center of a song and entrenches it. Keyboardist Kerri MacLellan joined Rankin and guitarist Alec O’Hanley to write more this time, reinforcing the band’s collective quest to break patterns heard on their first two albums. The results are beyond question: Blue Rev has more twists and surprises than Alvvays’ cumulative past, and the band seems to revel in these taken chances. This record is fun and often funny, from the hilarious reply-guy bash of “Very Online Guy” to the parodic grind of “Pomeranian Spinster.” Alvvays’ self-titled debut, released when much of the band was still in its early 20s, offered speculation about a distant future—marriage, professionalism, interplanetary citizenship. Antisocialites wrestled with the woes of the now, especially the anxieties of inching toward adulthood. Named for the sugary alcoholic beverage Rankin and MacLellan used to drink as teens on rural Cape Breton, Blue Rev looks both back at that country past and forward at an uncertain world, reckoning with what we lose whenever we make a choice about what we want to become. The spinster with her Pomeranians or Belinda with her babies? The kid fleeing Bristol by train or the loyalist stunned to see old friends return? “How do I gauge whether this is stasis or change?” Rankin sings during the first verse of the plangent and infectious “Easy on Your Own?” In that moment, she pulls the ties tight between past, present, and future to ask hard questions about who we’re going to become, and how. Sure, it arrives a few years later than expected, but the answer for Alvvays is actually simple: They’ve changed gradually, growing on Blue Rev into one of their generation’s most complete and riveting rock bands. クレジット2022年10月7日リリース Molly Rankin : Vocals, Guitar, Production Alec O’Hanley : Guitar, Keyboards, Bass, Production, Mixing, Engineering Kerri MacLellan : Keyboards, Vocals Sheridan Riley : Drums Abbey Blackwell : Bass Chris Dadge : Drums Moshe Fisher-Rozenberg : Drums Drew Jurecka - Cello, Viola Joseph Shabason - Flute, Baritone Saxophone Phil Hartunian - Guitar Shawn Everett : Production, Mixing, Engineering Additional Engineering : Stephen Koszler, Phil Hotz, Robbie Lackritz, Nyles Spencer, Julian Decorte, Amy Fort, Ivan Wayman Design / Layout by Scott Fitzpatrick, MR + AO Photography by Janet Vanzutphen Additional Work by Nora MacLeod + KM All Songs Written by MR + AO