Collaborative drug therapy modification (CDTM): Facilitators, barriers, and perceptions of individual pharmacist participation in Georgia.

Background: Georgia Board of Pharmacy (BOP) regulations permit pharmacists to engage in collaborative drug therapy modification (CDTM) with physicians, allowing them to perform patient assessments, adjust pharmacotherapy, and order laboratory tests. Pharmacist-led CDTM can positively affect health outcomes leading to reduced healthcare expenditures. CDTM is underutilized, with < 1% of Georgia pharmacists holding an active license to practice CDTM.

A comparative review of the mineralogical and chemical composition of African major bauxite deposits.

Bauxite, which is the main raw material that aluminium is extracted from was discovered in Africa in the early 1900s. Currently, the production and export capacities of the African Bauxite ore are about a third of the World's total capacity. However, the processes leading to the final finished product of; surface mining of the ore, refining ore into alumina and finally extracting the pure aluminium metal in high energy consuming smelters that employ the Hall-Héroult electrolysis process; seldom take place inside Africa.

Community pharmacists' naloxone counseling: A theory-informed qualitative study.

Background: Opioid-related overdose (ORO) deaths have reached a record high in the United States. Naloxone is an opioid antagonist that can rapidly reverse an opioid overdose. Pharmacists are in an ideal position to provide naloxone and related counseling, given their accessibility and expertise.

A Scoping Review for Debate-Style Journal Clubs in Health Professional Education.

Objectives: The objectives of this scoping review are to (1) describe the available literature regarding the utility of the debate-style journal club for health professional learners on literature evaluation skills and (2) report the themes found within debate-style journal club research and assessments in the context of professional education.

Findings: A total of 27 articles written in the English language were included in this scoping review. Published evaluations of debate-style journal clubs have been predominantly based in the pharmacy profession (48%, n = 13), but are reported in other health professions, such as medicine (22%, n = 6), dentistry (15%, n = 4), nursing (7%, n = 2), occupational therapy (4%, n = 1), and physical therapy (4%, n = 1), as well.

Spatio-temporal variation of groundwater chemistry in the Upper Oti Basin of Ghana.

The Oti Basin is located at northeastern part of Ghana. Two major geological formations of Voltaian sedimentary supergroup exist: Kwahu-Morago and Oti-Pendjari groups. A total of 133 groundwater samples and 7 surface water samples were collected for two major seasons, viz.

Distribution of age, sex, race, and ethnicity in COVID-19 clinical drug trials in the United States: A review.

Background: COVID-19 quickly overwhelmed the world, but disproportionately affects certain communities, particularly minority groups. Despite overrepresentation among COVID-19 cases and death, minority groups were underrepresented in some of the early COVID-19 clinical trials.

Objective: To assess and compare the demographic characteristics of COVID-19 clinical trial participants to national COVID-19 data.

Pharmacists' naloxone services beyond community pharmacy settings: A systematic review.

Background: Pharmacists' provision of naloxone services in community pharmacy settings is well-recognized. Recently, studies describing pharmacists' naloxone services in settings other than community pharmacies have emerged in the literature. There is a need to synthesize evidence from these studies to evaluate the scope and impact of pharmacists' naloxone services beyond community pharmacy settings.

Lessons learned from a formative study evaluating student pharmacists' experience with a case-based learning "choose your own adventure" activity.

Background: A case-based learning "Choose Your Own Adventure" (CBL-CYOA) activity was designed to support students in learning to identify drug-related problems and make clinical decisions related to drug therapy management. The purpose of this study was to describe student pharmacists' experiences in order to understand, from their perspective, which design features of the CBL-CYOA activity were valued as useful for developing clinical decision-making skills in an Applied Pharmacy Practice I course. However, several limitations with various features of study design minimized the usefulness of results.

Clinical Severity on Hospital Admission for COVID-19: An Analysis of Social Determinants of Health From an Early Hot Spot in the Southeastern U.S.

Introduction: Disparities in COVID-19 infection, illness severity, hospitalization, and death are often attributed to age and comorbidities, which fails to recognize the contribution of social, environmental, and financial factors on health. The purpose of this study was to examine relationships between social determinants of health (SDOH) and COVID-19 severity.

Methods: This multicenter retrospective study included adult patients hospitalized with COVID-19 in Southwest Georgia, U.

A Scoping Review Evaluating the Effect of SGLT-2 Inhibitors on Insulin Dose Requirements in Insulin-Dependent Patients With Type 2 Diabetes.

Objective: Assess evidence describing the effect of Sodium-Glucose Cotransporter-2 (SGLT2) inhibitors on total daily insulin (TDI) requirements in insulin-dependent patients with type 2 diabetes.

Data Sources: A scoping review was conducted following Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses Extension for Protocols and Scoping Reviews (PRISMA-ScR) guidelines. The search was conducted in PubMed; citation mapping was completed in Web of Science.

Team feedback: A missing piece of the interprofessional education puzzle.

Introduction: The ambulatory care practice model has long embraced interprofessional collaboration, well before it was formalized by the Interprofessional Education Collaborative. Establishing a mechanism to gather insight from other members of the interprofessional team may facilitate further development of interprofessional education (IPE).

Commentary: There is limited evidence investigating non-pharmacy trainees and medical provider perceptions of advanced pharmacy practice experience (APPE) student involvement in IPE.

Evaluation of quality measure attainment with pharmacist-delivered Medicare annual wellness visits.

Background: Medicare is required to fully cover annual wellness visits (AWVs) to increase access to preventive care. As health care converts to pay for performance models, clinical quality measures have increasing importance. Few studies have investigated the effect of pharmacist-delivered AWVs on clinical quality measure attainment in a rural family medicine (FM) clinic setting.

Diagnostic Utility of a Ferritin-to-Procalcitonin Ratio to Differentiate Patients With COVID-19 From Those With Bacterial Pneumonia: A Multicenter Study.

Background: There is an urgent need for accurate, rapid, inexpensive biomarkers that can differentiate coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) from bacterial pneumonia. We assess the role of the ferritin-to-procalcitonin (F/P) ratio to classify pneumonia cases into those due to COVID-19 vs those due to bacterial pathogens.

Methods: This multicenter case-control study compared patients with COVID-19 with those with bacterial pneumonia, admitted between March 1 and May 31, 2020.

Quality assessment and potential health risk of heavy metals in leafy and non-leafy vegetables irrigated with groundwater and municipal-waste-dominated stream in the Western Region, Ghana.

Vegetables cultivated in soil irrigated with untreated groundwater and municipal-waste-dominated (MWD) stream can elevate the concentration of heavy metals (Cd, Fe, Zn, Hg, Cr, and Ni) in edible parts of the crop, affecting food safety and public health worldwide. This study assessed the quality, sources, and distribution of heavy metals in surface soils, MWD stream and groundwater, and edible tissues of leafy and non-leafy vegetables from a major urban farm in the Sekondi-Takoradi metropolis, Ghana. Human health risk due to exposure to the metals in frequently consumed vegetables were investigated.

Diagnostic utility of a Ferritin-to-Procalcitonin Ratio to differentiate patients with COVID-19 from those with Bacterial Pneumonia: A multicenter study.

Importance: There is a need to develop tools to differentiate COVID-19 from bacterial pneumonia at the time of clinical presentation before diagnostic testing is available.

Objective: To determine if the Ferritin-to-Procalcitonin ratio (F/P) can be used to differentiate COVID-19 from bacterial pneumonia.

Design: This case-control study compared patients with either COVID-19 or bacterial pneumonia, admitted between March 1 and May 31, 2020.

Countermeasures to Coronavirus Disease 2019: Are Immunomodulators Rational Treatment Options-A Critical Review of the Evidence.

Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 is associated with higher concentrations of proinflammatory cytokines that lead to lung damage, respiratory failure, and resultant increased mortality. Immunomodulatory therapy has the potential to inhibit cytokines and quell the immune dysregulation. Controversial data found improved oxygenation after treatment with tocilizumab, an interleukin-6 inhibitor, sparking a wave of interest and resultant clinical trials evaluating immunomodulatory therapies.

Pharmacist-Led Annual Wellness Visits: A Review.

Objective: To summarize findings of pharmacist involvement with Medicare Annual Wellness Visits (AWV), including the number of pharmacist interventions, patient/provider satisfaction, and billing models.

Data Sources: A literature search was conducted using PubMed, ScienceDirect College Edition Journals Collection-Health and Life Sciences, Cochrane Library, CINAHL, Medline, and Academic Search Complete, including dates between January 01, 2011, and November 05, 2018.

Study Selection: Search was limited to full-text, peer-reviewed articles, published in English which were relevant based on identification of a pharmacist's role in AWV.

Contamination impact and human health risk assessment of heavy metals in surface soils from selected major mining areas in Ghana.

Analysis of soil samples around pristine and major gold-mining areas in Ghana was carried out for heavy metals as part of a larger soil contamination and metal background study. The surface soil samples were digested using microwave digester (aqua regia) and analyzed with ICP-MS for As, Cd, Hg, Zn, Co, Cu, Mn, Fe, Al, V, Cr, and Pb. The average concentrations (mg/L) for the metals ranged from 0.

Neuropsychiatric Symptoms in Dementia: Considerations for Pharmacotherapy in the USA.

Dementia affects all domains of cognition. The relentless progression of the disease after diagnosis is associated with a 98% incidence of neuropsychiatric symptoms (NPS) at some point in the disease, including depression, psychosis, agitation, aggression, apathy, sleep disturbances, and disinhibition. These symptoms can be severe and lead to excess morbidity and mortality.

Distribution and risk assessment of banned and other current-use pesticides in surface and groundwaters consumed in an agricultural catchment dominated by cocoa crops in the Ankobra Basin, Ghana.

The existence of pesticides, such as organochlorine pesticides, parathion-ethyl, methamidophos which is banned globally and some current-use non-banned pesticides of organophosphorus and synthetic pyrethroids in freshwater sources is an ecological and public health concern in many countries, including Ghana. Prompted by this concern, the exposure levels and risk assessment of these pesticides to humans and non-target organisms via groundwater and surface water sources in an agricultural catchment dominated by cocoa crops in the Ankobra Basin, Ghana, were investigated. The individual concentrations of the banned pesticides in the surface water and groundwater samples varied from < LOD to 0.

Levels of arsenic, mercury, cadmium, copper, lead, zinc and manganese in serum and whole blood of resident adults from mining and non-mining communities in Ghana.

Human beings working or living near an industrial site where toxic chemicals such as As, Hg, Cd, Cu, Mn, Pb, Zn and or their compounds are used or indiscriminately discharged into the environment, are constantly exposed to such chemicals via ingestion (drinking or eating), dermal contact or inhalation (breathing). However, in developing countries such as Ghana, limited data on levels of the aforementioned chemicals in whole blood and serum of human beings as a result of exposure to the aforementioned chemicals from mining communities and non-mining communities is preventing effective policy formulation to protect human health. Hence, this study was undertaken to measure the levels of the aforementioned toxic chemicals in whole blood and serum of 300 resident adults from mining (Tarkwa Nsuaem Municipality Assembly (TNMA) and Prestea Huni Valley District (PHVD)) and non-mining (Cape Coast Metropolis) communities in Ghana, using neutron activation analysis (NAA).

Assessing the Environmental and Socio-Economic Impacts of Artisanal Gold Mining on the Livelihoods of Communities in the Tarkwa Nsuaem Municipality in Ghana.

Gold mining has played an important role in Ghana's economy, however the negative environmental and socio-economic effects on the host communities associated with gold mining have overshadowed these economic gains. It is within this context that this paper assessed in an integrated manner the environmental and socio-economic impacts of artisanal gold mining in the Tarkwa Nsuaem Municipality from a natural and social science perspective. The natural science group collected 200 random samples on bi-weekly basis between January to October 2013 from water bodies in the study area for analysis in line with methods outlined by the American Water Works Association, while the social science team interviewed 250 residents randomly selected for interviews on socio-economic issues associated with mining.