[Pharmacies as healthcare delivering facilities in home care].

Confronted with an aging society, saving costs by efficiently utilizing medical resources has become urgent in Japan. Therefore, due to medical treatment fee constraints, hospitals now have to focus on reducing the length of one's hospital stays resulting in patients who are heavily dependent on medical care being discharged and shifted to home care. Especially for cancer, which is the most common cause of death in Japan, the system of healthcare delivery from inpatient treatment to home palliative treatment has been dramatically improved. Against such a backdrop, this medical supply delivery role of pharmacies was clearly and newly codified into medical law in 2006, thus enabling pharmacies to fulfill their newfound responsibilities as healthcare delivering facilities 24 hours, a day, 365 days a year.