The Commission for Certification in Geriatric Pharmacy (CCGP) is a non-profit organization

Non-profit organization

Nonprofit organization is neither a legal nor technical definition but generally refers to an organization that uses surplus revenues to achieve its goals, rather than distributing them as profit or dividends...

 which has established a voluntary professional certification

Professional certification

Professional certification, trade certification, or professional designation, often called simply certification or qualification, is a designation earned by a person to assure qualification to perform a job or task...

 program for pharmacist

Pharmacist

Pharmacists are allied health professionals who practice in pharmacy, the field of health sciences focusing on safe and effective medication use...

s. Pharmacists must pass a written examination to become certified and must re-certify every five years. Candidates are expected to be knowledgeable about principles of geriatric pharmacotherapy

Pharmacotherapy

Pharmacotherapy is the treatment of disease through the administration of drugs. As such, it is considered part of the larger category of therapy....

 and the provision of pharmaceutical care

Pharmacy practice

Pharmacy practice is the discipline of pharmacy which involves developing the professional roles of pharmacists.-Areas of practice:Areas of pharmacy practice include:*Disease-state management...

 to the elderly.

A pharmacist who is certified in geriatric pharmacy practice is designated as a "Certified Geriatric Pharmacist," and may use the acronym "CGP" as a suffix

Suffix

In linguistics, a suffix is an affix which is placed after the stem of a word. Common examples are case endings, which indicate the grammatical case of nouns or adjectives, and verb endings, which form the conjugation of verbs...

 to their personal name

Personal name

A personal name is the proper name identifying an individual person, and today usually comprises a given name bestowed at birth or at a young age plus a surname. It is nearly universal for a human to have a name; except in rare cases, for example feral children growing up in isolation, or infants...

.

CCGP was founded in 1997 by the American Society of Consultant Pharmacists

American Society of Consultant Pharmacists

The American Society of Consultant Pharmacists is an international professional association that provides education, advocacy, and resources to advance the practice of senior care pharmacy, and that represents the interests of consultant pharmacists who work with elderly patients.The organization...

 and R. Tim Webster

R. Tim Webster

R. Tim Webster, SCD was a founder and long-time executive director of the American Society of Consultant Pharmacists . He was born October 9, 1946, in Martins Ferry, Ohio and lived in St. Clairsville, Ohio until he graduated from high school...

, and it is based in Alexandria, Virginia

Alexandria, Virginia

Alexandria is an independent city in the Commonwealth of Virginia. As of 2009, the city had a total population of 139,966. Located along the Western bank of the Potomac River, Alexandria is approximately six miles south of downtown Washington, D.C.Like the rest of northern Virginia, as well as...

. As of 2007, CCGP has certified pharmacists in Australia

Australia

Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

, Canada

Canada

Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...

, Panama

Panama

Panama , officially the Republic of Panama , is the southernmost country of Central America. Situated on the isthmus connecting North and South America, it is bordered by Costa Rica to the northwest, Colombia to the southeast, the Caribbean Sea to the north and the Pacific Ocean to the south. The...

, Puerto Rico

Puerto Rico

Puerto Rico , officially the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico , is an unincorporated territory of the United States, located in the northeastern Caribbean, east of the Dominican Republic and west of both the United States Virgin Islands and the British Virgin Islands.Puerto Rico comprises an...

, Sweden

Sweden

Sweden , officially the Kingdom of Sweden , is a Nordic country on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. Sweden borders with Norway and Finland and is connected to Denmark by a bridge-tunnel across the Öresund....

, Singapore

Singapore

Singapore , officially the Republic of Singapore, is a Southeast Asian city-state off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, north of the equator. An island country made up of 63 islands, it is separated from Malaysia by the Straits of Johor to its north and from Indonesia's Riau Islands by the...

, United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 and Japan

Japan

Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...

.

External links

• Commission for Certification in Geriatric Pharmacy - Home page for CCGP