The Conference "Pharmacists and patient safety" took place on 8 October in Riga, Latvia. It was open to the public and brought together 93 participants to discuss how pharmacist-managed services can contribute to patient safety and respond to peoples' needs.

Pharmacists have had a share already in establishing a culture of patient safety throughout the entire pharmaceutical system, and the Conference reflected on how pharmacists continuously can be actively involved in building up such culture, together with other health professionals and the patients, and contribute to developing a non-blaming culture.

Three key speakers set the scene by outlining the problem from various perspectives, looking at the underlying aspects that make patient safety a hot topic on the political agenda and describing pharmacists' involvement in collaborative initiatives with other health professionals for patient safety.  The following two sessions questioned whether pharmacists do make a difference, and gave examples on solutions to the problems related to adherence to therapies and quality assurance.

The conference opened a lively debate on pharmacists' contribution to patient safety in general, as well as more specifically to the development and implementation of a reporting system and the establishment of an open culture to deal with errors and omissions more effectively. 

The discussions clearly showed the need for interdisciplinary collaboration to achieve safety and quality; only a systemic approach will effectively contribute to patient safety.  Integrated education and training of health practitioners must become the standard; today team practice is common, but the training of health professionals is typically isolated by discipline. It is therefore fundamental to advancing the effectiveness of teams, and important elements in such a process will be to ensure that all care providers and the patient have access to patient medical information and, that the responsibility is recognized and accepted, and accountability shared by all team members.

A poster exhibition was organized during the conference, and 13 posters were presented and displayed which related to different subjects within patient safety. The posters were publicly presented and discussed during the networking market, chaired by Dr Suzete Costa, who guided the participants through the exhibition by interviewing poster presenters.