Pharmacist-led care in NB: What we learned from the clinic pilot
Author: DataNB
Posted on Nov 5, 2025
Category: DataNB
In 2023, six pharmacies across New Brunswick opened their doors to a new kind of healthcare service: the Pharmacist Care Clinic pilot. These clinics were designed to expand the role of pharmacists in delivering frontline care — offering assessment, testing, and prescribing for strep throat, as well as medication management for chronic conditions like asthma, cardiovascular disease, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, and diabetes.
Whether someone had a family doctor or not, the clinics aimed to provide timely, proactive support — and to see what impact that could have on patient outcomes and the broader healthcare system.
To understand how the pilot worked and what it achieved, DataNB conducted a two-part evaluation. The first report, released earlier in 2025, focused on describing clinic operations, services delivered, and client experiences. Now, Part 2 of the evaluation takes a deeper look at impact — asking how the clinics affected health outcomes, healthcare resource use, and perceptions among clients, staff, and key stakeholders.
It shows that over 3,000 services were provided to nearly 2,600 people, with high satisfaction among clients and strong engagement from pharmacists. Many clients didn’t have a regular primary care provider, and the clinics helped fill that gap. Use of virtual care services like eVisitNB declined after clinic visits, and clients reported feeling more confident in managing their health. Staff echoed these sentiments, noting improvements in medication adherence and disease control.
Of course, the evaluation also surfaced areas for improvement, with interviewees showing the need for clearer operational guidelines, better public communication, and stronger integration with other healthcare services. Some felt that the clinics worked best when pharmacists were part of a broader care team, rather than operating in isolation.
While the pilot itself has concluded, the findings offer valuable insights into how pharmacist-led care can support chronic disease management, improve access, and reduce pressure on other parts of the healthcare system. As New Brunswick continues to explore new models of care, these lessons will help inform future decisions about how best to leverage the expertise of pharmacists in supporting population health.