Pharmacy Daily | Pharmacists critical in aged care

PHARMACISTS have a vital role to play in reducing the high prevalence of adverse drug events in residential aged care facilities, researchers from the University of Tasmania believe.

In a systematic review published in the British Journal of Clinical Pharmacology, the authors found pharmacist-led interventions including medication reviews and educational programs were among the most common approaches to reducing medication-related harm in older people living in nursing homes.

The authors found that medication reviews, conducted as either a single component or as part of a multicomponent pharmacist-led intervention, were frequently reported to reduce adverse drug events such as cognitive impairment, falls, agitation and anticholinergic drug burden.

"This review's findings indicate that pharmacist interventions appear to improve medication safety in residential aged care facilities, based on observed reductions in adverse drug events especially when the provision of care involves a combination of strategies and collaboration with other healthcare providers," the authors said.

"As experts in pharmacotherapy, pharmacists are well-suited to perform medication reviews and determine underlying causes of drug-related issues and provide solutions to avoid them.

"Pharmacist-led medication review is recognised as an important intervention for reducing adverse drug events in older people, thus improving patient safety.

"Similarly, older people in residential aged care facilities benefit most from medication reviews as they are more prone to experiencing adverse drug events."

The authors added that the implementation of pharmacist-led interventions in collaboration with physicians may decrease the burden on the healthcare system.

They added that future studies would need to examine how often pharmacists need to perform interventions that may curb instances of medication-related harm in patients living in residential aged care facilities.