Publications by authors named "T Christiaens"
Background: Long-term antidepressant (AD) use, much longer than recommended by guidelines, may cause harms and generate unnecessary costs. Community pharmacists have frequent contact with AD users and advise them on appropriate and safe medication use. GPs recognised pharmacists as potential sources of additional support for the AD discontinuation process, but there is a lack of knowledge about pharmacists' views.
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- Direct oral anticoagulants (DOACs) can interact with other drugs, increasing the risk of bleeding or blood clots, so proper management of these drug-drug interactions (DDIs) is crucial for patient safety.
- A study in 201 Belgian community pharmacies screened DOAC users for DDIs and involved pharmacists contacting doctors for management advice, using a specific DDI list for guidance.
- The study found 875 DDIs among 751 patients, with many resulting in pharmacotherapy changes, showing that active management of DDIs can significantly enhance the safe use of DOACs in at-risk patients.
Introduction: Long-term antidepressant (AD) use, much longer than recommended, is very common and can lead to potential harms.
Objective: To investigate the existing literature on perspectives of health professionals (HPs) regarding long-term AD treatment, focusing on barriers and facilitators to discontinuation.
Methods: A systematic review with thematic synthesis.
Rational prescribing is essential for the quality of health care. However, many final-year medical students and junior doctors lack prescribing competence to perform this task. The availability of a list of medicines that a junior doctor working in Europe should be able to independently prescribe safely and effectively without supervision could support and harmonize teaching and training in clinical pharmacology and therapeutics (CPT) in Europe.
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- The study aimed to examine how incorporating the Dutch National Pharmacotherapy Assessment (DNPA) in medical training affects junior doctors' prescribing knowledge and skills, and to explore the link between curriculum type and their prescribing competence.
- Researchers analyzed data from a 2016 longitudinal study involving 556 junior doctors from 11 medical schools in the Netherlands and Belgium, assessing their knowledge and skills through multiple-choice questions and clinical scenarios over a year after graduation.
- Findings indicated that junior doctors trained with the DNPA scored significantly higher in knowledge assessments and improved more in skills over time compared to those from conventional curricula, particularly those with a mixed curriculum approach.