2026 Eastern States Conference

Title: Implementation of a Pharmacist-Led Shared Medical Appointment for Weight Management at a Veterans Affairs Medical Center  
Authors: Shelby Efird, PharmD, Anita Henderson, PharmD, BCACP, Merid Belayneh, PharmD, Sarah Pierce, PharmD, BCACP; VA Maryland Health Care System 
Learning Objective: Describe the development and implementation of a pharmacist-led shared medical appointment for weight management pharmacotherapy. 
Background/Objective: This project describes the creation and implementation of a pharmacist-led shared medical appointment (SMA) for weight management pharmacotherapy with the goal of improving access to weight management services.  
Methods:
This quality improvement project was conducted within the VA Maryland Health Care System. The SMA was run by Primary Care Clinical Pharmacist Practitioners (CPPs) who provided disease-state education, brief lifestyle intervention, and medication management. Patients were screened via chart review to determine eligibility. Eligible patients included Veterans not already prescribed a glucagon-like-peptide-1 receptor agonist (GLP-1 RA), active participation in lifestyle interventions within the past 12 months, and who met VA criteria for GLP-1 RA therapy. Ineligible patients included those age 65 years or older with a BMI under 35 kg/m2, those with known contraindications to GLP-1 RA therapy, or those with non-optimized type 2 diabetes requiring medication adjustments. This referral-based clinic conducted all visits via VA Video Connect and included up to eight Veterans per 60-minute visit with two CPPs facilitating. Descriptive statistics were used to analyze results. 
Results:
Eight SMA cohorts were piloted from October 2025 to February 2026. Eighty-seven Veterans were referred with 61 meeting eligibility and were scheduled. Of patients eligible for the SMA, 59 completed the first visit and were prescribed tirzepatide. Participants had a mean age of 54 years (range 29-77), were predominantly male (76.2%), and had a mean BMI of 39.44 kg/m2 (range 31.27-53.87).  Veterans attended an initial visit followed by three bimonthly groups during medication titration with discharge to primary care providers for long-term follow-up.  As part of ongoing process improvements, various SMA structures were trialed. The final SMA structure consisted of one CPP facilitating four to five Veterans in a 60 minute visit.   
Conclusion:
This project demonstrates that a pharmacist-led SMA model can expand access to weight management services and allow CPPs to manage a higher patient volume than traditional individual visits leading to increased access to care. Future steps include scaling the program to all Patient Aligned Care Team CPPs across the VA Maryland Health Care System.  
Self-Assessment Question: 
Pharmacists within the VA are well equipped to lead shared medical appointments for weight management. (T/F)