The Effectiveness of Pharmaceutical Service for INPATDRP

Overview

Medication risk is defined as the potential for loss or harm that may result from the use of medications during the course of treatment. Drug-related problems (DRPs) are defined as events or situations involving drug therapy that actually or potentially interfere with desired health outcomes. DRPs represent a significant aspect of medication risk in hospitalized patients, and the study and management of DRPs can effectively reduce the incidence of medication risk. DRPs are associated with both therapeutic efficacy and adverse drug events, and the timely identification and reduction of DRPs can enhance clinical efficacy and prevent the occurrence of adverse events. DRPs pose a challenge to the clinician, and that may affect patient's clinical outcomes and may result in morbidity or mortality and increased health care costs. Health care costs may become a burden to the patient or may be to the government or to the third parties. Clinical Pharmacy is a discipline that promotes the quality use of medicines through evidence-based medicine and helps in identification and resolving DRPs. A clinical pharmacist through his/her clinical accuracy checking may identify DRPs and come out with suitable solutions to resolve the same. Consequently, the aims of our study were to investigate the efficacy and safety effects of pharmacist-implemented drug-related problems (DRPs)-based interventions on patients' medication therapy.

The study was conducted as a parallel randomized controlled study in a large general hospital in China.The study planned to enroll 220 inpatients aged 18 to 100. Subjects were randomly assigned to the intervention and control groups. Pharmacists managed patients' medications using a process for solving problems. This included: 1. Collecting information, assessing the patient's condition, and checking the medication plan. 2. Identifying and solving problems with medications. 3. Providing guidance on medications and creating personal medication lists. 4. Following up and reassessing. For patients in the intervention group, medication therapy management was done at the first visit. This included assessment, information collection, and possible interventions at the first visit and at the 1, 3, and 6 month follow-up visits. In the control group, patients were assessed at the first visit and at the 1, 3, and 6month follow-up visits. Information was collected, dosage and contraindications were explained, and necessary interventions were performed in the third month.