Fidelity to and utility of a home blood pressure self-monitoring regime in people with pre-hypertension: results from the REVERSE study.

Introduction: Around 40% of adults have pre-hypertension (120-139/80-89mmHg) increasing their risk of developing hypertension and associated cardiovascular conditions. Guidance on pre-hypertension management focuses on improving lifestyle. Self-monitoring may improve awareness and understanding of blood pressure (BP) for people with pre-hypertension, allowing them to modify their lifestyle risks.

Facilitating self-care through community pharmacy in England.

In England, almost all the population are within a short walk of a community pharmacy. This network of pharmacies provides a range of services, most of which are commissioned and remunerated through a nationally agreed contract with the National Health Service (NHS). Over time this contract has seen funding move from the traditional core service of dispensing medicines, toward patient-facing clinical services.

Non-pharmacological interventions for the reduction and maintenance of blood pressure in people with prehypertension: a systematic review protocol.

Introduction: Prehypertension is defined as blood pressure that is above the normal range but not high enough to be classed as hypertension. Prehypertension is a warning of development of hypertension as well as a risk for cardiovascular disease, heart attack and stroke. In the UK, non-pharmacological interventions are recommended for prehypertension management but no reviews have focused on the effectiveness of these types of interventions solely in people with prehypertension.

What makes a multidisciplinary medication review and deprescribing intervention for older people work well in primary care? A realist review and synthesis.

Background: A third of older people take five or more regular medications (polypharmacy). Conducting medication reviews in primary care is key to identify and reduce/ stop inappropriate medications (deprescribing). Recent recommendations for effective deprescribing include shared-decision making and a multidisciplinary approach.

Automated search methods for identifying wrong patient order entry-a scoping review.

Objective: To investigate: (1) what automated search methods are used to identify wrong-patient order entry (WPOE), (2) what data are being captured and how they are being used, (3) the causes of WPOE, and (4) how providers identify their own errors.

Materials And Methods: A systematic scoping review of the empirical literature was performed using the databases CINAHL, Embase, and MEDLINE, covering the period from database inception until 2021. Search terms were related to the use of automated searches for WPOE when using an electronic prescribing system.

Risk reduction intervention for raised blood pressure (REVERSE): protocol for a mixed-methods feasibility study.

Introduction: Around 40% of adults have pre-hypertension (blood pressure between 120-139/80-89), meaning they are at increased risk of developing hypertension and other cardiovascular disease-related conditions. There are limited studies on the management of pre-hypertension; however, guidance recommends that it should be focused on lifestyle modification rather than on medication. Self-monitoring of blood pressure could allow people to monitor and manage their risk status and may allow individuals to modify lifestyle factors.

Chemical Synthesis of Innovative Silver Nanohybrids with Synergistically Improved Antimicrobial Properties.

Background: The wide use of antibiotics has created challenges related to antibiotic-resistant bacteria, which have been increasingly found in recent decades. Antibiotic resistance has led to limited choices of antibiotics. Multiple old antimicrobial agents have high antimicrobial properties toward bacteria, but they unfortunately also possess high toxicity toward humans.

Assessing the hidden burden and costs of COVID-19 pandemic in South Asia: Implications for health and well-being of women, children and adolescents.

The COVID-19 pandemic has disproportionately affected vulnerable populations. With its intensity expected to be cyclical over the foreseeable future, and much of the impact estimates still modeled, it is imperative that we accurately assess the impact to date, to help with the process of targeted rebuilding of services. We collected data from administrative health information systems in six South Asian countries (Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka), to determine essential health services coverage disruptions between January-December 2020, and January-June 2021, compared to the same calendar months in 2019, and estimated the impact of this disruption on maternal and child mortality using the Lives Saved Tool.

Persistently normal blood tests in patients taking methotrexate for RA or azathioprine for IBD: a retrospective cohort study.

Background: Disease-modifying anti-rheumatic drugs (DMARDs), including methotrexate and azathioprine, are commonly used to treat rheumatoid arthritis (RA) and inflammatory bowel disease (IBD). Blood-test safety monitoring is mainly undertaken in primary care. Normal blood results are common.

Price versus clinical guidelines in primary care statin prescribing: a retrospective cohort study and cost simulation model.

Objective: To investigate the relative impact of generic entry and National Institute for Health and Care Excellence clinical guidelines on prescribing using statins as an exemplar.

Design: Retrospective analysis of statin prescribing in primary care and cost simulation model.

Setting: Royal College of General Practitioners Research and Surveillance Centre (RCGP R&SC) database and Prescription Cost Analysis (PCA) database.

Characterising risk of non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drug-related acute kidney injury: a retrospective cohort study.

Background: Non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) are commonly prescribed for pain and inflammation. NSAID complications include acute kidney injury (AKI), causing burden to patients and health services through increased morbidity, mortality, and hospital admissions.

Aim: To measure the extent of NSAID prescribing in an adult population, the degree to which patients with potential higher risk of AKI were exposed to NSAIDs, and to quantify their risk of AKI.

Reduction of oral liquid controlled drugs discrepancy in day-to-day practice.

Objectives: The storage, use and disposal of controlled drugs (CDs) in hospitals and other healthcare centres are governed by a combination of government legislation and local policy. In the UK, a running balance must be kept for Schedule 2 CDs and when discrepancies arise, they must be investigated and reconciled. Policies on acceptable discrepancies are varied and based on anecdotal evidence.

An embedded implementation research initiative to tackle service delivery bottlenecks in the expanded programme on immunisation in Pakistan: Overview and reflections.

Background: Embedded implementation research (IR) can play a critical role in health systems strengthening by tackling systems and implementation bottlenecks of a program. To achieve this aim, with the financial support of GAVI, the Vaccine Alliance, in 2016, the Government of Pakistan, UNICEF and the Alliance for Health Policy and Systems Research (AHPSR) launched an Embedded IR for Immunisation Initiative (the Initiative) to explore health systems and implementation bottlenecks, and potential strategies to tackle such bottlenecks in the Expanded Programme on Immunisation (EPI) in Pakistan. In total, 10 research teams were involved in the Initiative, which was the first of its kind in the country.

Implementing an emergency department pharmacy service and its effect on medication safety.

Objectives: This service innovation project examined the effect an Emergency Department (ED) pharmacy service had on medication-related safety markers.

Methods: A pre-test/post-test design captured medication-related safety markers on admission data at ward level after patients had been seen in the ED. The markers were, medication omitted, incorrect medicines prescribed and the number of incorrect doses or frequency of doses.

The Wessex Dementia Friendly Pharmacy Framework.

Objectives: To develop and launch a dementia friendly framework for community pharmacies in the Wessex region of England.

Methods: A framework consisting of essential (mandatory) and additional (non-mandatory) criteria were devised by local stakeholders and external scrutiny from the Alzheimer's Society. The framework was designed to allow pharmacy teams to achieve essential criteria without the need for approval by others (e.

Carrying out embedded implementation research in humanitarian settings: A qualitative study in Cox's Bazar, Bangladesh.

Background: Embedded implementation research (IR) promotes evidence-informed policy and practices by involving decision-makers and program implementers in research activities that focus on understanding and solving existing implementation challenges. Although embedded IR has been conducted in multiple settings by different organizations, there are limited experiences of embedded IR in humanitarian settings. This study highlights some of the key challenges of conducting embedded IR in a humanitarian setting based on our experience with the Rohingya refugee population in Cox's Bazar, Bangladesh.

Differential diagnosis in pharmacy practice: Time to adopt clinical reasoning and decision making.

The delivery of healthcare in most developed countries is under increasing pressure. Ageing populations with increasingly complex needs, coupled with financial constraints and imbalances in workforce, mean that healthcare policies look to contain cost and utilise resource as effectively as possible. Self-care is now widely advocated as a mechanism to manage acute presentations with pharmacy identified as a key resource to support such policy.

Hospital referral of older patients to community pharmacy: outcome measures in a feasibility study.

Background Post-discharge medication use reviews in English community pharmacy aim to improve medicine support to recently discharged patients. However, there is little evidence of their impact on patient outcomes. Objective Identify potential outcome measures to investigate the impact of a hospital to community pharmacy referral service for older patients that utilises post-discharge medication reviews.

Impact of pharmacy medicine information service advice on clinician and patient outcomes: an overview.

Background: Pharmacy-led medicine information (MI) services are available in many countries to support clinicians and patients make decisions on use of medicines.

Objectives: To establish what impact, if any, pharmacy-led MI services have on clinician and patient outcomes.

Methods: All published works indexed in Embase or PubMed, meeting this review's inclusion and exclusion criteria, that wholly or partially attempted to measure the effects of MI advice were retrieved and assessed.

Equitable coverage? The roles of the private and public sectors in providing maternal, newborn and child health interventions in South Asia.

Introduction: The private sector accounts for an important share of health services available in South Asia. It is not known to what extent socioeconomic and urban-rural inequalities in maternal, newborn and child health (MNCH) interventions are being affected by the presence of private providers.

Methods: Nationally representative surveys carried out from 2009 to 2015 were analysed for seven of the eight countries in South Asia, as data for Sri Lanka were not available.

Gender-related differences in care-seeking behaviour for newborns: a systematic review of the evidence in South Asia.

Introduction: Data indicate substantial excess mortality among female neonates in South Asia compared with males. We reviewed evidence on sex and gender differences in care-seeking behaviour for neonates as a driver for this.

Methods: We conducted a systematic review of literature published between January 1st, 1996 and August 31st, 2016 in Pubmed, Embase, Eldis and Imsear databases, supplemented by grey literature searches.

Correction: A systematic review of the outcome data supporting the Healthy Living Pharmacy concept and lessons from its implementation.

[This corrects the article DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.

Provision of Bilingual Dispensing Labels to Non-Native English Speakers: An Exploratory Study.

Patients with limited English proficiency living in the U.K. receive prescribed medication labels in English.