A clinical practice agreement between pharmacists and surgeons streamlines medication management.

Background: Collaborative practice agreements (CPAs), which have been widely used in ambulatory care, were applied to hospital surgical teams in a postsurgical colorectal surgery unit at Mayo Clinic Rochester (Minnesota).

Methods: The CPA allowed pharmacists the decision rights to initiate, modify, or discontinue medications in accordance with the surgical teams' practice standards, evidence-based medicine, and/or institutional policies without specific request and response from the surgeon/provider. Interventions for CPA and non-CPA groups were captured from a prospectively maintained database.