Letters
Clinical medication review by pharmacists would improve care
| The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below. |
EDITOR
Unsurprisingly, Zermansky et al found that the involvement
of pharmacists improves the quality of medication management for
older people.1 Repeat prescribing was poorly monitored in
older people, but the authors miss an opportunity for a more rigorous
analysis of this problem.
In the United Kingdom incrementally dispensed drugs require a doctor's signature to validate each increment-an expedient adopted for administrative convenience and the probity of pharmacists. This results in general practitioners having to sign many pieces of paper each day. Such a practice undervalues their time, and the sheer number of individual items inevitably affects quality control.
The challenge of adequately reviewing complex drug regimens cannot be
accommodated in the 7-10 minute intervals that define general
practitioners' clinical practice in the United Kingdom. The role of
the pharmacist is also degraded, being reduced to that of a passive
dispenser, who might occasionally issue warnings in the case of
overlooked
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Relevant Article
- Randomised controlled trial of clinical medication review by a pharmacist of elderly patients receiving repeat prescriptions in general practice
- Arnold G Zermansky, Duncan R Petty, David K Raynor, Nick Freemantle, Andy Vail, and Catherine J Lowe
BMJ 2001 323: 1340.[Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
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[Abstract] [Full text]
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- An integrated approach
- Ryan M. Cassity
bmj.com, 2 Mar 2002 [Full text]
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