Leukotriene Modifiers & Zetia?

Earlier this week, I was attending one of the Clinical Review Committee (CRC) meetings and 2 main topics were of discussion: (1) antibiotics- therapeutics rankings within the different antibiotic classes on Prime's formulary and (2) criteria for the Zetia utilization management program, aka criteria patients must meet in order to receive coverage from their insurance.

Up to this point in my internship, I haven't been called out among a group of pharmacists to answer a question. So the meeting goes along and we started discussing clindamycin. It flashed through my head how I did a limited review on clindamycin 2 1/2 weeks ago. (Limited review involves researching the literature to see if there's any updates on therapy regarding a medication within the past year). At that time, my preceptor hadn't told me that I would be expected to talk about it at a future meeting....until the CRC meeting this past week....on the spot during the meeting. I didn't see it coming (I probably should have), but yeah, my preceptor turned the meeting over to me to discuss updates on clindamycin. The last time I had looked at my work was 2 1/2 weeks ago...needless to say I wasn't 100% prepared so that was kind of embarrassing.

However, I totally redeemed myself later in the meeting. We were going over the utilization management program of Zetia and I identified a HUGE mistake in the document. I spoke up and said, "On page 4, what does leukotriene modifiers have to do with Zetia?" And the pharmacist I directed my question to goes, "It does not have anything to do with it..." This document was being reviewed by 13 pharmacists, and me, the intern, found this mistake! All the pharmacists in the room were laughing how it was me out of all them that identified the error.

(In case you don't know, Zetia is a medication for high cholesterol and leukotriene modifiers are involved in treatment of allergies). It turns out the pharmacist was also working on criteria for leukotriene modifiers so that's why it was accidentally in the Zetia criteria.

But yeah, I will be more prepared from now on. For instance, I created the monograph for Vimovo (combination esomeprazole and naproxen product) and people from AstraZeneca will be visiting Prime to talk about their product. I will be prepared for that presentation since I will be the "expert."