APhA 2025: Training Pharmacy Technicians as Community Health Workers

In an interview with Pharmacy Times®, Nancy Lyons, BSPharm, MBA, CDCES, vice president and chief pharmacy officer from Health Mart, discussed the role of pharmacy technicians as community health workers, highlighting her presentation at the American Pharmacists Association (APhA) Annual Meeting & Exposition.

Lyons shared that pharmacy technicians are being trained as community health workers (CHW) to enhance patient care beyond traditional pharmacy roles. By identifying social determinants of health and forming community connections, these technicians can help patients overcome barriers to health care access. She highlighted that the training provides career development opportunities for technicians and supports pharmacists in delivering more comprehensive care. Lyons emphasized that this innovative approach benefits patients, pharmacy teams, and the broader health care ecosystem by creating more engaged and resourceful health care professionals.

Pharmacy Times: What specific gaps in health care access do you believe pharmacy technicians, in their role as community health workers, are best positioned to address?

Nancy Lyons: There are so many things that pharmacy technicians do today, but once they get trained as a community health worker in general, they're able to go deeper into the conversations and the benefits they have — both for patients and for the members of the health care team that they are as a technician, for the deeper data that they will get for pharmacists. We're really looking for them to work on that. Then, with the community health worker training, looking for the social determinants of care gaps, arming them with tools so that they're able to really go beyond their traditional skills in the pharmacy.

Pharmacy Times: Can you describe an innovative way you envision pharmacy technicians could implement the community health worker model within a pharmacy setting to improve health outcomes?

Lyons: It's about 3 core pieces. First it is finding the right person. Even though pharmacy technicians are essential, not all of them truly engage in the community. Every pharmacist that's ever worked behind the counter with a pharmacy technicians knows those individuals who have that connection. They're the ones that, honestly, the patients sometimes prefer to talk to over the pharmacist. Finding that right person is key.

Second is really looking for the appropriate training program. There is a standard put together by the CHW core competency, or the National C3 group, that works on all the roles and the skills that a technician needs, and trainings that are built on those concepts are essential. It's also important to remember that they're also a pharmacy technician first, and often the application of community health worker skills into practice is part of that training. We partnered over a year ago, with CEimpact, to provide scholarships to over 200 pharmacy technicians to do that good mix so that they're not going past their scope of practice as a pharmacy technician, but really, again, just enhancing those skills.

Pharmacy Times: If you were tasked with establishing a community health worker referral service in your pharmacy, what key steps would you take to ensure its success?

Lyons: It's really about the things that we talked about so the right person, first the right training, but then challenging them also to go into forming community connections. There are only so many people that automatically set foot in a pharmacy, but the role of the community health worker is really beyond the walls of the pharmacy. Forming partnerships with leaders and faith-based organizations and other public health driven goal setting organizations to really show the benefits of health care that can come together.

Pharmacy Times: What are some potential positive outcomes you foresee from pharmacy technicians serving as community health workers, both for patients and for the pharmacy itself?

Lyons: I'll start with the pharmacy and specifically the technician. One of the things we like to talk about when we're in investing in any training, even beyond certified Pharmacy Technician Training, is that career development for that essential member of the health care team. The pharmacy technician sometimes thinks of themselves as non-essential, and we've seen the last few years that they are absolutely an essential part of the team to making sure care is delivered. An additional certification can turn up that career path and make loyalty for those pharmacy technicians to stay.

For the pharmacy itself, pharmacists are here at the APhA meeting today to talk about advancing care and advancing the skills and resources that they do. They can only do that if they have a team with them that's all united with that. The pharmacy technician, who's also trained as a community health worker, is better able to do some of the pre assessments and collecting of the information that the pharmacist needs to provide care. Oftentimes, CHWs can also gain payment for the pharmacy, and so it opens additional revenue streams.

Saving the best for last, the patients who understand that it's stigma free to come into a community pharmacy and really engage with those health care professionals with any barriers they're having. From childcare to transportation that may be preventing them from getting the services or taking the medications appropriately, the patients are truly the ones that are going to benefit by being able to match those things up.