Collaborative Practice Agreement · PharmD
Montana Written Collaborative Pharmacy Practice Agreement for Pharmacists
Required. The Written Collaborative Pharmacy Practice Agreement is the written instrument Montana law names for a Pharmacist working with a physician. Below: the board that governs it, what it must contain, and the terms it has to carry.
Represents Montana's Collaborative Pharmacy Practice Agreement (CPA) tier for drug-therapy management, not ordinary dispensing licensure, which needs no physician agreement and is out of scope here. Any pharmacist 'involved in patient care' may enter a CPA — no board-certification/residency requirement found. CPA must be renewed at least every 2 years.
What a Montana Written Collaborative Pharmacy Practice Agreement must contain
Governed by the Montana Board of Pharmacy. Each numbered item is a statutory requirement the agreement must satisfy.
The Pharmacist may engage in collaborative pharmacy practice with the Physician pursuant to a written, signed collaborative pharmacy practice agreement, entered into voluntarily by the Parties, as defined at Mont. Code Ann. § 37-7-101. Under such an agreement, the Pharmacist may manage drug therapy for the Physician's patients according to a written protocol.
Source: Mont. Code Ann. § 37-7-101
The agreement shall identify the Physician and the Pharmacist as parties, describe the types of drug therapy management decisions the Pharmacist may make, and establish a method for monitoring the outcomes of that therapy management. A signed copy of the agreement shall be kept at the Pharmacist's practice site and produced to the Montana Board of Pharmacy upon request.
- The Written Collaborative Pharmacy Practice Agreement on file also carries 1 scope, 1 education, 1 registration, 1 authority clauses, generated in the document itself.
Statutes and rules cited
- Mont. Code Ann. § 37-8-409statute
Conditions under which an advanced practice registered nurse may practice; current text contains no physician collaboration or supervision agreement requirement.
- Mont. Code Ann. § 37-20-203statute
Physician assistant collaborative agreement requirement below 8,000 hours of postgraduate clinical experience, and exemption once that threshold is met.
- Mont. Code Ann. § 37-7-101statute
Definitions of collaborative pharmacy practice and collaborative pharmacy practice agreement under the Montana Pharmacy Practice Act.
Terms it has to carry
Ratio, proximity, chart review, meeting and prescribing terms the agreement has to carry, from the state's supervision rules.
Proximity
Not codified — left to the agreement
Supervision ratio
Not codified — no cap on file
Chart review
Not codified — left to the agreement
Meeting cadence
Not codified — left to the agreement
Prescriptive authority
Covered by the practice agreement · no controlled-substance authority
Immunization-certified pharmacists may prescribe/administer immunizations listed in § 37-7-105 without any CPA; a CPA is needed only for immunizations outside that list given to patients ≥7 years old.
Written agreement
Required
Practice ownership (corporate practice of medicine)
Non-licensee ownership permitted — No pharmacist-ownership requirement was found in Montana pharmacy licensing statute/rule — pharmacy permits are not restricted to pharmacist owners the way the medical/APRN Professional Corporation framework above restricts those entities.
Whether Montana requires a licensed pharmacist-in-charge with retained professional control (as in NC/VA) was not independently confirmed in this research pass.
Legal sources for these rules (3)
- Mont. Code Ann. § 37-7-101 — Definitions (Collaborative Pharmacy Practice Agreement)
- Mont. Code Ann. § 37-7-105 — Collaborative Pharmacy Practice; Controlled-Substance Exclusion
- Montana Board of Pharmacy Rules (as of Sept. 30, 2024)
About Montana's rules
House Bill 810 (2023) would have imposed a 2-year physician/NP-collaboration requirement on APRNs; it was referred to committee and this research could not confirm it became law — current APRN statute text found shows no such requirement, so NP/CRNA/CNM/CNS are coded as independent, but verify this hasn't changed before relying on it. Montana repealed its corporate-practice-of-medicine statute in 1995; CPOM entries below reflect residual board rule, not a clear statutory line.
Other clinicians in Montana: see the state overview.