Benchmarking hospital clinical pharmacy practice using standardised key performance indicators (KPIs).

Hospital pharmacy services support quality use of medicines and medication safety through clinical pharmacy activities such as medication reviews and patient education. These activities can be measured and monitored using evidence-based and standardised key performance indicators (KPIs), which highlight the value of pharmacy services. Standardisation of KPIs supports long-term benchmarking and inter- and intra-site comparisons to target key areas for improvement in clinical pharmacy services.

Consumer perceptions of direct-to-consumer electronic prescription services in Queensland, Australia.

Background: Direct-to-consumer (DTC) electronic prescription services (EPS) are a novel addition to the Australian healthcare landscape. This study aimed to explore consumers' perceptions on how this model of care supports the delivery of best-practice care.

Method: Focus groups participants were recruited through social media and included adults aged 18 years or older, Queensland (Australia) residents, and interested in DTC EPS.

Reducing Medical Admissions and Presentations Into Hospital through Optimising Medicines (REMAIN HOME): a stepped wedge, cluster randomised controlled trial.

Objective: To investigate whether integrating pharmacists into general practices reduces the number of unplanned re-admissions of patients recently discharged from hospital.

Design, Setting: Stepped wedge, cluster randomised trial in 14 general practices in southeast Queensland.

Participants: Adults discharged from one of seven study hospitals during the seven days preceding recruitment (22 May 2017 - 14 March 2018) and prescribed five or more long term medicines, or having a primary discharge diagnosis of congestive heart failure or exacerbation of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.

Medication use and cognitive impairment among residents of aged care facilities.

Background: Potentially inappropriate polypharmacy is common in residential aged care facilities (RACF). This is of particular concern among people with cognitive impairment who, compared with cognitively intact residents, are potentially more sensitive to the adverse effects of medications.

Aim: To compare the patterns of medication prescribing of RACF residents based on cognitive status.

A scoping review of the use and impact of telehealth medication reviews.

Background: Telehealth has been proposed as a mechanism to overcome the practical difficulties associated with conducting timely and efficient medication reviews particularly in rural and remote settings.

Objective: The aim was to examine the literature on the use and impact of telehealth-facilitated medication reviews.

Methods: A scoping review of the literature was conducted.

The Promotion of Policy Changes Restricting Access to Codeine Medicines on Twitter: What do National Pain Organizations Say?

Codeine is one of the most common opioid medicines for treating pain. Australia introduced policy changes in February 2018 to up-schedule codeine to prescription-only medicine due to concerns of adverse effects, opioid dependency, and overdose-related mortality. This study investigated the frequency and content of messages promoted on Twitter by 4 Australian peak pain organizations, pre- and postpolicy implementation.

Consumer perspectives on pharmacy staff roles in providing oral health services in Australia.

Australian and international findings report pharmacy staff are motivated to expand and undertake new roles in public health and expressed a strong interest in providing oral healthcare services to the community. We sought to describe consumer experiences within primary oral healthcare, and views about pharmacy staff roles and boundaries in providing oral health services as perceived by a sample of consumers living within metropolitan Australia. Sampling occurred purposively to enable diverse perspectives on the topic.

Using telehealth to enable collaboration of pharmacists and geriatricians in residential medication management reviews.

Background Practical issues impede optimum collaboration between pharmacists and other clinical specialists in the current Australian residential medication review services which potentially affect efficiency, timeliness and quality of outcomes. Objective This mixed methods study aimed to explore the potential value of an existing telehealth platform to enable collaboration of pharmacists and geriatricians in residential medication reviews. Setting Long term care facilities in Australia.

Exploring oral healthcare management across Australian community pharmacies using case vignettes.

Objectives: In Australia, more than 80% of pharmacists and pharmacy assistants are consulted for oral healthcare advice up to five times or more each week. This study assesses Australian community pharmacy staff's (pharmacists and pharmacy assistants) ability to recognize and manage common oral health presentations using case vignettes, and determine whether appropriate identification and management are associated with self-reported confidence.

Methods: Five oral healthcare case vignettes were developed based on previous literature by a multidisciplinary team of dental and pharmacy practitioner academics.

Interventions to Optimise Prescribing in Older People with Dementia: A Systematic Review.

Background: Older adults living with dementia may have a higher risk of medication toxicity than those without dementia. Optimising prescribing in this group of people is a critically important yet challenging process.

Objective: Our aim was to systematically review the evidence for the effectiveness of interventions for optimising prescribing in older people with dementia.

Investigating the management of potentially cancerous nonhealing mouth ulcers in Australian community pharmacies.

We sought to examine the management and referral of nonhealing mouth ulcer presentations in Australian community pharmacies in the Greater Brisbane region. Trained simulated patients visited 220 randomly selected community pharmacies within the Greater Brisbane region in 2016. Simulated patients enacted two nonhealing (>1 month) mouth ulcer scenarios: A direct product request (DPR) (n = 110) and a symptom-based request (SBR) (n = 110).

A national survey exploring oral healthcare service provision across Australian community pharmacies.

Objectives: This study investigated pharmacists' and pharmacy assistants' current practices and perspectives with regard to oral healthcare provision across Australian community pharmacies.

Design: Cross-sectional study. A questionnaire for each pharmacist and pharmacy assistant cohort was developed and administered by online or postal means.

A multifaceted intervention to reduce inappropriate polypharmacy in primary care: research co-creation opportunities in a pilot study.

Co-creation (or co-design) represents the highest form of stakeholder engagement, but it can be infeasible to co-create with all stakeholders through all stages of a research project. The choice of stakeholders for co-design will depend on the study purpose and context of change. For this deprescribing pilot study, general practitioners were recognised as a critical gateway for co-creation, with patients' perspectives of the deprescribing process to be assessed in the evaluation of the pilot.

Describing the role of Australian community pharmacists in oral healthcare.

Objectives: To investigate community pharmacist's attitudes, beliefs and practices towards oral health in the Australian setting, describe the frequency and nature of consumer enquiries relating to oral health, and gain insight regarding smoking cessation support for people experiencing oral health problems.

Methods: An online questionnaire was developed based on previous research, validated to ensure accuracy and reliability, and convenience sampling used to advertise across major pharmacy organisational websites and newsletters to maximise community pharmacist responses.

Key Findings: One hundred and forty-four valid community pharmacist responses were descriptively analysed.

First do no harm: a real need to deprescribe in older patients.

Inappropriate polypharmacy in older patients imposes a significant burden of decreased physical functioning, increased risk of falls, delirium and other geriatric syndromes, hospital admissions and death. The single most important predictor of inappropriate prescribing and risk of adverse drug events in older patients is the number of prescribed medications. Deprescribing is the process of tapering or stopping drugs, with the goal of minimising polypharmacy and improving outcomes.

An evaluation of medication review reports across different settings.

Background: There is a growing body of evidence which supports that a pharmacist conducted medication review increases the health outcomes for patients. A pharmacist integrated into a primary care medical centre may offer many potential advantages in conducting medication reviews in this setting however research describing this is presently limited.

Objective: To compare medication review reports conducted by pharmacists practicing externally to a medical centre to those medication review reports conducted by an integrated practice pharmacist.