Improving job satisfaction and enlarging the role of technicians.

The process used in preparing this administrative report provided the means of documenting departmental support of technician task expansion, cost benefits, increased availability of professional time, and the need for a dynamic department. Some of the benefits to St. Luke's Regional Medical Center and its Pharmacy Department were an increase in technician job satisfaction, improved quality of patient care attributable to the increased scope of pharmacy service, and up to 8554 hours per year of professional time available for more clinically oriented responsibilities. If technician turnover were decreased by half, technician pricing errors eliminated, and technicians assumed the identified technical tasks, potential monetary benefits could be as much as +116,900 per year. The departmental cost of implementing these recommendations would be an additional 4.16 technician FTEs, and the professional time for training, supervising, and coordinating technicians and functions. These recommendations were well received by pharmacy administration, and the committee was asked to develop a list of priorities and an implementation plan for administrative approval.