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Search results for "Hospitals"

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Journal Article > Study

Reducing unacceptable missed doses: pharmacy assistant–supported medicine administration.

Baqir W, Jones K, Horsley W, et al. Int J Pharm Pract. 2015;23:327-332.

Omitted or delayed medication doses occur frequently in hospitals. Although the majority of these medication administration errors do not harm patients, some have serious effects and contribute to patient deaths. Recent interventions, such as barcode medication administration systems, may help mitigate this problem, but the evidence to date has been mixed on how electronic systems affect omitted or delayed doses. This study evaluated the strategy of providing the support of pharmacy assistants to nurses during medication administration on an acute care ward at a district hospital in England. The intervention group was compared to both intraward and interward control groups. Over the course of 2 weeks, unacceptable omitted medication doses were observed in 18.5% of patients on the control ward, versus only 1.1% of patients on the wards with pharmacy assistant support. While these findings suggest a possible robust solution to this common problem, major limitations to this study include the brief study period and the lack of an economic analysis to support the feasibility of this approach.

Journal Article > Study

Reducing error in anticoagulant dosing via multidisciplinary team rounding at point of care.

Sharma M, Krishnamurthy M, Snyder R, Mauro J. Clin Pract. 2017;7:953.

Anticoagulants are considered high-risk medications due to their narrow therapeutic window and association with adverse drug events. This study suggests that integration of a clinical pharmacist into the inpatient team may help prevent anticoagulation dosing errors and resultant harm to patients.

Cases & Commentaries

Correct Treatment Plan for Incorrect Diagnosis: A Pharmacist Intervention

  • Web M&M

Scott D. Nelson, PharmD, MS; March 2017

Although meningitis and neurosyphilis were ruled out for a woman presenting with a headache and blurry vision, blood tests returned indicating latent (inactive) syphilis. Due to a history of penicillin allergy, the patient was sent for testing for penicillin sensitivity, which was negative. The allergist placed orders for neurosyphilis treatment—a far higher penicillin dose than needed to treat latent syphilis, and a treatment regimen that would have required hospitalization. Upon review, the pharmacist saw that neurosyphilis had been ruled out, contacted the allergist, and the treatment plan was corrected.

Journal Article > Study

Evaluation of electronic health record implementation on pharmacist interventions related to oral chemotherapy management.

Finn A, Bondarenka C, Edwards K, Hartwell R, Letton C, Perez A. J Oncol Pharm Pract. 2016 Aug 29; [Epub ahead of print].

Chemotherapy administration has a well known potential for errors. This pre–post study found that implementation of an electronic health record–facilitated, pharmacist-led, standardized ordering and monitoring program for oral chemotherapy led to better identification of prescribing errors. This research adds to the evidence for the role of pharmacists in making cancer care safer.

Journal Article > Review

Do pharmacist-led medication reviews in hospitals help reduce hospital readmissions? A systematic review and meta-analysis.

Renaudin P, Boyer L, Esteve MA, Bertault-Peres P, Auquier P, Honore S. Br J Clin Pharmacol. 2016;82:1660-1673.

Pharmacists play a crucial role in ensuring patient safety in hospitalized patients. However, prior studies have found inconsistent effects of medication reconciliation performed by pharmacists at preventing medication errors. This systematic review determined that pharmacist-performed medication reviews may reduce readmissions and emergency department visits after discharge, but the overall quality of the literature was not robust enough to definitively reach this conclusion.

Journal Article > Study

ASHP national survey of pharmacy practice in hospital settings: monitoring and patient education—2015.

Pedersen CA, Schneider PJ, Scheckelhoff DJ. Am J Health Syst Pharm. 2016;73:1307-1330.

Pharmacists play a central role in medication safety. The authors present the results of the 2015 American Society of Health-System Pharmacists survey, which specifically looked at medication monitoring and patient education practices. The survey results support the growing role of pharmacists in counseling high-risk patients, discharge medication counseling, therapeutic drug monitoring, and medication order review.

Journal Article > Study

An insurer's care transition program emphasizes medication reconciliation, reduces readmissions and costs.

Polinski JM, Moore JM, Kyrychenko P, et al. Health Aff (Millwood). 2016;35:1222-1229.

This intervention study provided pharmacist support to perform medication reconciliation and care coordination for patients discharged from the hospital. Compared to similar-risk patients who did not receive the intervention, those who had medication reconciliation by pharmacists were less likely to be readmitted to the hospital. These results add to the existing literature supporting the utility of pharmacist-led care transition interventions.

Journal Article > Study

Impact of pharmacist-provided medication therapy management on healthcare quality and utilization in recently discharged elderly patients.

Haag JD, Davis AZ, Hoel RW, et al. Am Health Drug Benefits. 2016;9:259-268.

Postdischarge pharmacist medication counseling has been shown to prevent readmissions. This randomized controlled trial of pharmacist-delivered telephone medication counseling did not show any difference in appropriateness of medication use. The authors noted the high frequency of inappropriate medication use overall.

Journal Article > Study

Partnered pharmacist charting on admission in the general medical and emergency short-stay unit—a cluster-randomised controlled trial in patients with complex medication regimens.

Tong EY, Roman C, Mitra B, et al. J Clin Pharm Ther. 2016;41:414-418.

Medication discrepancies during hospital admission are common and can lead to preventable harm. This study examined the impact of having a pharmacist review medical charts of patients with complex medication regimens who were admitted to a general medical or emergency short-stay unit. The authors found that partnering medical staff with a pharmacist to review patients' admission medications in the chart significantly decreased inpatient medication errors.

Journal Article > Study

Reducing readmission at an academic medical center: results of a pharmacy-facilitated discharge counseling and medication reconciliation program.

Zemaitis CT, Morris G, Cabie M, Abdelghany O, Lee L. Hosp Pharm. 2016;51:468-473.

Adverse events following hospital discharge can lead to costly hospital readmissions. This study demonstrated a modest decrease in readmissions following implementation of pharmacist-led medication reconciliation and postdischarge telephone calls. These results are consistent with prior studies that determined pharmacist support can help reduce readmissions.

Journal Article > Study

Utilization of pharmacy technicians to increase the accuracy of patient medication histories obtained in the emergency department.

Rubin EC, Pisupati R, Nerenberg SF. Hosp Pharm. 2016;51:396-404.

This retrospective study found that pharmacy technicians were able to collect a more accurate medication list for patients in the emergency department compared to the usual medication list obtained by other personnel. This finding suggests that better integration of the pharmacy team into emergency care could improve patient safety, consistent with previous studies investigating the role of pharmacists in emergency departments.

Journal Article > Study

Medication reconciliation in oncological patients: a randomized clinical trial.

Vega TG, Sierra-Sánchez JF, Martínez-Bautista MJ, García-Martín F, Suárez-Carrascosa F, Baena-Cañada JM. J Manag Care Spec Pharm. 2016;22:734-740.

This randomized trial found that a pharmacist-led medication reconciliation intervention was able to reduce the number of unintended medication discrepancies in oncology patients admitted to a Spanish hospital, although the clinical impact of resolving such discrepancies was not reported.

Journal Article > Review

Medication safety systems and the important role of pharmacists.

Mansur JM. Drugs Aging. 2016;33:213-221.

Preventing adverse drug events is a major priority for accrediting and regulatory agencies. This review describes a framework for medication safety systems, including design considerations to integrate safety across the medication use process and unique roles for clinical pharmacists. Elements of the framework address risk awareness, barriers to error reporting, and the need to utilize performance improvement methods.

Journal Article > Study

Effect of pharmacist counseling intervention on health care utilization following hospital discharge: a randomized control trial.

Bell SP, Schnipper JL, Goggins K, et al; Pharmacist Intervention for Low Literacy in Cardiovascular Disease (PILL-CVD) Study Group. J Gen Intern Med. 2016;31:470-477.

This randomized controlled trial at two academic medical centers studied the potential benefits of providing pharmacist medication reconciliation and counseling, along with individualized telephone follow-up after discharge, for adult patients hospitalized with acute coronary syndrome or acute decompensated heart failure. This extensive intervention did not reduce readmissions or emergency department visits within 30 days of discharge, though there was a small positive effect seen in patients with low health literacy.

Journal Article > Commentary

Medication safety pharmacy technician in a large, tertiary care, community hospital.

Brown KN, Bergsbaken J, Reichard JS. Am J Health Syst Pharm. 2016;73:188-191.

This commentary describes the development of a dedicated medication safety position held by a pharmacy technician to coordinate activities such as incident reporting and investigation, documenting and communicating lessons learned, and providing support for improvement projects.

Journal Article > Study

Impact of a drug shortage on medication errors and clinical outcomes in the pediatric intensive care unit.

Hughes KM, Goswami ES, Morris JL. J Pediatr Pharmacol Ther. 2015;20:453-461.

Drug shortages can result in safety consequences, as studies have shown a higher rate of treatment failure and increased adverse events associated with unavailability of first-line therapies. However, this study did not find any change in adverse events in pediatric intensive care unit patients during a shortage of commonly used sedatives and injectable opioid pain medications. The authors note that advance warning of the shortage and development of standardized algorithms for drug substitution may have mitigated the potential safety hazards.

Journal Article > Review

Impact of pharmacist involvement in the transitional care of high-risk patients through medication reconciliation, medication education, and postdischarge call-backs (IPITCH Study).

Phatak A, Prusi R, Ward B, et al. J Hosp Med. 2016;11:39-44.

Medication errors are a common cause of adverse events after hospital discharge. This randomized controlled trial found that integrating pharmacists into the discharge process improved patient satisfaction and reduced adverse drug events, emergency department visits, and readmissions in the 30 days after discharge. Pharmacists conducted medication reconciliation, provided patient education, and had multiple telephone contacts with patients after discharge.

Book/Report

Safety in Medication Use.

Tully MP, Franklin BD, eds. Boca Raton, FL: CRC Press, Taylor and Francis Group; 2016. ISBN: 9781482227000.

Errors in the prescription, preparation, and administration of medications hinder safe patient care. This book summarizes theories and international practices to provide clinical pharmacists with strategies to address barriers to medication safety.

Journal Article > Study

Comparison of medication safety systems in critical access hospitals: combined analysis of two studies.

Cochran GL, Barrett RS, Horn SD. Am J Health Syst Pharm. 2016;73:1167-1173.

Medication errors are a well-recognized source of preventable patient harm and result from mistakes made during medication prescribing, transcribing, dispensing, and administration processes. This study looked at the impact of several factors on reducing medication errors in critical access hospitals. Investigators found that dispensing by an onsite pharmacist and the use of barcode technology for administration were both associated with a statistically significant reduction in medication errors.

Journal Article > Study

Effect of a ward-based pharmacy team on preventable adverse drug events in surgical patients (SUREPILL study).

Surgery and Pharmacy in Liaison (SUREPILL) Study Group. Br J Surg. 2015;102:1204-1212.

This controlled study evaluated the effect of a protocolled pharmacist intervention—which included medication reconciliation and regular medication review—on medication errors in elective surgery patients. There was no difference in the incidence of adverse drug events compared to patients receiving usual care.

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