Implementing medicare education for medication access: A review of the literature using the RE-AIM framework.

Background: The rising cost of medications has a disproportionate effect on community-dwelling older adults despite policy changes designed to improve medication access. Medicare insurance counseling provided by pharmacists, including individualized plan comparison and enrollment assistance, improves medication adherence and health care utilization, yet only 15% of community dwelling older adults report using a pharmacy or pharmacist for Medicare information. To determine what information is available to inform expanding implementation of pharmacy as a resource for Medicare insurance counseling, a systematic review of published studies using the RE-AIM (Reach, Effectiveness, Adoption, Implementation, and Maintenance) framework was conducted.

Practical Approaches to Antipsychotic-Associated Corrected QT Interval Prolongation in Patients With Serious Mental Illness: A Review of Cases.

There is no consensus for assessment and management of patients with serious mental illness (SMI) who are at risk for cardiac morbidity and mortality due to antipsychotic-associated QTc prolongation. The objective of this review was to assess methods for risk scoring, QT correction calculation, and clinical management in SMI patients with antipsychotic-associated QTc prolongation. A search was performed in PubMed for case reports that described QTc prolongation in adult patients with schizophrenia or bipolar disorder prescribed an antipsychotic.

Mindset and team communication in pharmacists: Examination of pharmacist's self-views.

Objectives: Pharmacists provide care in a complex adaptive system, which requires action and teamwork to address unexpected outcomes. We assessed practicing pharmacists' self-views of growth mindset and team communication across multiple practice settings.

Design: The validated Growth Mindset and Team Communication (GMTC) tool, a multicomponent quantitative and qualitative survey instrument was used to conduct a descriptive study of pharmacist self views.

Communicating definitive uncertainty: Teaching pharmacy students to say "I don't know".

Background And Purpose: Communicating uncertainty is an art requiring practice. The purpose of this study was to compare pedagogies for the instruction of pharmacy students in communicating definitive uncertainty.

Educational Activity And Setting: A case scenario featuring a busy physician asking a question without a definitive answer was directed to the pharmacy student using two pedagogies: (1) in-person standardized client and (2) virtual written case.

A Teamwork Workshop to Improve Pharmacy Students' Growth Mindset and Communication Skills.

To determine the impact of a workshop on the growth mindset and team communication of first year Doctor of Pharmacy (PharmD) students. A multi-week workshop was developed for first year pharmacy students. The workshop included completion of the StrengthsFinder 2.

Psychometric validation of a growth Mindset and Team Communication Tool to measure self-views of growth mindset and team communication skills.

Objective: The objective of this study was to develop and conduct psychometric validation of a tool to assess self-views of a growth mindset and team communication skills among pharmacists.

Design: The Mindset and Team Communication Tool was developed to assess self-views of growth mindset and team communication. The survey consisted of 2 parts: (1) 14 items on growth mindset and (2) 13 items on team communication; a 4-point Likert scale of agreement was used as an option to answer all items.

Rates and Types of Medication-Related Problems in Patients Rehospitalized Within 30 Days of Discharge From a Community Hospital.

Impact of medication-related problems (MRPs) on persistently high hospital readmission rates are not well described. The purpose of this study was to determine the rate and type of MRPs attributed to rehospitalization within 30 days of discharge from a general internal medicine hospitalists' service at a nonacademic medical center. A retrospective cohort study was conducted evaluating consecutive patients readmitted within 30-days after discharge to home from an internal medicine hospitalist service.

Design of hospital errors and omissions activities that include patient-specific medication related problems.

Background And Purpose: Medication-related problems persist in hospital settings. New types of errors have emerged with changing technology. There is a need for updated, realistic, and patient-specific activities to train student pharmacists to identify medication-related problems.

Evaluation of an Evidence-Based Medicine Curriculum in a PGY1 Pharmacy Residency Program Using the Fresno Test.

To assess the effectiveness of a longitudinal evidence-based medicine (EBM) curriculum to improve pharmacy resident knowledge and skills in evidence-based practice as measured by the Fresno Test. Residency program director and clinical pharmacist preceptors in a community teaching hospital developed a longitudinal EBM curriculum for a postgraduate year one (PGY1) pharmacy practice residency. The program was offered as a yearlong series of 1-hour meetings to train residents in evidence-based practice.

Experience with a pharmacy technician medication history program.

Purpose: The implementation and outcomes of a pharmacy technician medication history program are described.

Summary: An interprofessional medication reconciliation team, led by a clinical pharmacist and a clinical nurse specialist, was charged with implementing a new electronic medication reconciliation system to improve compliance with medication reconciliation at discharge and capture compliance-linked reimbursement. The team recommended that the pharmacy department be allocated new pharmacy technician full-time-equivalent positions to assume ownership of the medication history process.

High-Risk Non-ST Elevation Acute Coronary Syndrome Outcomes in Patients Treated with Unfractionated Heparin Monitored Using Anti-Xa Concentrations Versus Activated Partial Thromboplastin Time.

Background: While the activated partial thromboplastin time (aPTT) is the most widely used assay to monitor unfractionated heparin (UFH), providing a general measure of the extent of anticoagulation, it does not reliably correlate with the blood concentration of heparin or its antithrombotic effect. While cost and availability have limited the widespread use of UFH in hospitals, monitoring UFH with heparin levels has been shown to reduce both the number of monitoring tests and the time to a therapeutic range.

Objectives: To compare outcomes in patients with non-ST elevation acute coronary syndrome (ACS) treated with weight-based UFH monitored with anti-Xa concentrations versus aPTT.