Inconclusiveness of psychometric testing of medication adherence questionnaires.

Purpose: To propose a paradigm change for the validation procedures of medication adherence questionnaires.

Methods: A total of 121 validation procedures of unique questionnaires for medication adherence were analyzed.

Results: "Construct validity" and "internal consistency" were most often assessed, and test results varied largely.

Knowledge and attitudes of German and Swiss community pharmacists towards biologicals and biosimilars - a prospective survey before and after the COVID-19 pandemic.

Background: Knowledge, attitudes and substitution laws of biosimilars are not consistent across countries. Biosimilar acceptance among patients and healthcare professionals may be suffering from gaps in knowledge and understanding about biosimilars and their regulatory approval process. Pharmacists' roles and responsibilities changed considerably during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Development and validation of the 15-STARS - A novel self-report pharmacy-based questionnaire to screen for medication non-adherence.

Background: Published scales measuring medication adherence are myriad. There is a need for a tool that guides towards downstream adherence interventions.

Objective: To develop and validate a self-report questionnaire able to detect modifiable determinants of medication non-adherence.

Patients' Use of a Standardized Medication List - A Mixed Methods Study.

Purpose: A medication list (ML) is a document listing the patient's entire medication, instructions for use, and indications. In Germany, a national standard was established in 2016 by law. However, data on patients' use of this standardized ML are scarce.

Self-care and self-medication as central components of healthcare in Germany - on the way to evidence-based pharmacy.

In Germany, self-care is, above all interpreted as the prevention and treatment of minor injuries and illnesses by the patients themselves - that is, without a physician's prescription or medical advice. Maintaining one's health in the sense of a preventive approach through non-medicinal measures also plays an important role. Self-medication in this context is the treatment with approved over-the-counter-(OTC)-medications.

Task sharing in an interprofessional medication management program - a survey of general practitioners and community pharmacists.

Background: Pharmacist-led medication review and medication management programs (MMP) are well-known strategies to improve medication safety and effectiveness. If performed interprofessionally, outcomes might even improve. However, little is known about task sharing in interprofessional MMP, in which general practitioners (GPs) and community pharmacists (CPs) collaboratively perform medication reviews and continuously follow-up on patients with designated medical and pharmaceutical tasks, respectively.

Community pharmacists' preparedness for substituting biologics and dispensing biosimilars - Lessons learned from a multinational survey.

Interchangeability between biological medicines and biosimilars, and subsequent substitution by pharmacists represent an important opportunity for costs savings for health care systems. Because biological medicines are complex products, the expert role of the pharmacist to inform patients and support physicians is indispensable. However, regulations on substitution of biosimilars differ around the globe, such that a substitution that is allowed in one country may be forbidden in another.

Patients' perception on generating medication plans in an interprofessional medication management program: a mixed-methods study.

A medication plan (MP) provides an overview of a patient's entire medication. In the interprofessional medication management program ARMIN (ARzneiMittelINitiative Sachsen-Thueringen), MPs are jointly generated by general practitioners (GPs) and community pharmacists (CPs). We aimed to assess patients' initial acceptance of the service, how they use the printed MP, and whether they perceived a benefit from it.

Primary healthcare policy and vision for community pharmacy and pharmacists in Germany.

Germany is the highest populated country in Europe with a population of 82.3 million in 2019. As in many other developed countries, it has an aging population.

[The PRIMA Project - Electronically-Supported Physician-Pharmacist Cooperation to Generate and Update Medication Plans in Germany].

Background: A complete overview on the patient's medication is one precondition for medication safety. For this, a complete and current medication plan (MP) is an appropriate instrument. We aimed to develop and implement software to evaluate and exchange medication plans in local software systems of general practitioners (GPs) and community pharmacies (CPs).

[Standardized national medication plan : The pilot projects MetropolMediplan 2016, model region Erfurt, and PRIMA].

Since 1 October 2016, all legally insured persons are entitled to a nationwide medication plan (BMP) under certain conditions (according to § 31a SGB V, E-Health Law). The catalogue of measures of the 3rd Action Plan 2013-2015 for the improvement of drug therapy safety (AMTS) provided for the testing of a medication plan in practice, including its acceptance and practicability in three model projects. These three projects - MetropolMediplan 2016, Erfurt, and PRIMA - are presented and recommendations are derived on the basis of the collected findings.

Evaluating patients' comprehensibility of a standardized medication plan.

Purpose: A standardized medication plan for patients has been developed and recently enacted into German law depicting all medicines taken. It can only increase medication safety if patients use and understand it. We evaluated patients' comprehensibility of the medication plan and analyzed potential variables influencing patients' understanding.

Patients' handling of a standardized medication plan: a pilot study and method development.

Purpose: The Action Plan for Medication Safety by the German Federal Ministry of Health introduced a standardized medication plan (MP), a printable document for the patient. The practical handling needs to be tested before the nationwide implementation in Germany. Therefore, the aims of our study were 1) to develop an instrument to evaluate the usage of the standardized MP, 2) to assess if patients can locate, and 3) understand important information.

Drug-related problems in prescribed medicines in Germany at the time of dispensing.

Background: Drug-related problems (DRPs) can have an important impact on the effectiveness and safety of pharmacotherapy. In Germany, the frequency of DRPs in prescribed medicines in ambulatory care is not yet known. Objective To quantify DRPs in prescribed medicines identified by community pharmacists (CPs) at the time the medicine is dispensed.

Evaluation of the Pharmacy Safety Climate Questionnaire in European community pharmacies.

Objective: To evaluate the internal reliability, factor structure and construct validity of the Pharmacy Safety Climate Questionnaire (PSCQ) when applied to a pan-European sample of community pharmacies.

Design: A cross-sectional survey design was used.

Setting: Community pharmacies in Denmark, Germany, the Netherlands, Portugal and Great Britain.

Nature and frequency of drug-related problems in self-medication (over-the-counter drugs) in daily community pharmacy practice in Germany.

Purpose: To quantify drug-related problems (DRPs) in self-medication (over-the-counter [OTC] drug use) identified by community pharmacists (CPs) in Germany at the time the drug is dispensed.

Methods: One hundred CPs were asked to document 100 consecutive customers presenting symptoms or requesting OTC drugs using a standardized documentation form. The number of 10,000 encounters seemed reasonable to evaluate the set objective.

Compliance with antithrombotic guidelines in surgery patients in German hospitals: a multicenter study involving pharmacy interns.

Despite the existence of antithrombotic guidelines, there is low compliance with these guidelines in clinical practice. Until now pharmacy interns (PIs) have not been involved in this process. The objectives were to involve PIs to evaluate compliance with antithrombotic guidelines for VTE prophylaxis in surgery patients, and in cases of noncompliance to carry out pharmaceutical interventions.

Population pharmacokinetics of high-dose carboplatin in children and adults.

Introduction: Although for conventional dosing of carboplatin, several strategies are available to individualize the dose based on renal function measurements, such approaches are still rare for high-dose regimens with autologous stem cell support. The purpose of this study was to investigate the influence of patient- and regimen-specific factors on the pharmacokinetics of carboplatin and to compare the performance of different dose individualization strategies (Calvert, Newell, Chatelut, flat dosing, dosing according to body surface area).

Patients And Methods: A combined data set with 69 patients from five studies, including 13 pediatric patients, was subject to a population pharmacokinetic analysis using NONMEM.

Pharmaceutical care in community pharmacies: practice and research in Germany.

Objective: To discuss the provision of pharmaceutical care in community pharmacies in Germany including community pharmacy, organization and delivery of health services, pharmacy education, community pharmacy services, research in community pharmacy, and future plans for community pharmacy services.

Findings: In Germany, cognitive pharmaceutical services have been developed for more than 12 years. Several studies and programs have shown that pharmaceutical care and other pharmaceutical services are feasible in community pharmacy practice and that patients benefit from these services.

Effect of selenite combined with chemotherapeutic agents on the proliferation of human carcinoma cell lines.

Selenite is frequently used in combination with cancer chemotherapeutic agents to reduce side effects. However, the cytoprotective activity of selenite may also reduce the efficacy of chemotherapeutic drugs on tumor cells. This study was designed to examine the effects of selenite combined with cytotoxic agents used in clinical protocols [e.