Oslo Pharmacist Intervention Study - Effect on Readmissions

Summary

Earlier studies have shown that pharmacists detect and solve drug related problems (DRPs) when they are a part of the multidisciplinary treatment-team at hospital wards. However, in the Norwegian health care system, there is a lack of studies on the effect of pharmacist intervention on clinically relevant outcomes. Hospital readmissions has both clinical and economical negative effects, and time outside the hospital until an eventual readmission is considered as a clinical relevant outcome measure. The investigators are conducting a randomized controlled trial at an internal medicine ward at Oslo University Hospital. 400 acute admitted patients using minimum 4 regular drugs from minimum 2 drug groups will be enrolled in the study. Patients randomized to the Control group will receive standard care (without a pharmacist involved) and patients randomized to the Intervention group will receive a pharmacist in their treatment team during the hospital stay. The study hypothesis is that including a pharmacist in the multidisciplinary treatment team at a hospital ward, will improve the patients drug treatment, hence lead to an increased time outside the hospital until an eventual readmission.

The inclusion of patients was completed March 17th 2016 With 399 patients randomised. The last day of follow-up on readmission and mortality was December 31, 2017. The Application process for outcome data to the Norwegian Patient Registry and the Norwegian Cause of Death Registry started in June 2017 and lasted until May 2018. Huge workload at the Registers entails a very long processing time for outcome data. On May 25, 2018 the statistical analysis plan was finalized and signed, hereunder the analysis population defined and the endpoint analyses detailed. Outcome datafiles from patient registries was prepared for analysis May 29 to June 6, 2018. Blinded outcome analyses was conducted June 8, 2018.

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The investigators have obtained approval for a protocol amendment to use the data from the study in further analyses togheter with data from 100 new patients admitted to the internal medicine ward. The hypothesis is that a set of patient characteristics can identify patients who are at high risk of drug-related readmissions and who would benefit most from the pharmaceutical intervention.The investigators aim to identify these patients by building a statistical model based on significant variables from the 399 patients collected in the randomised controlled trial. The statistical model will be validated using data from 100 new patients admitted to the internal medicine ward.

The inclusion of patients to this New sample was finalised July 6th 2018 (primary completion). Data on hospital readmissions and death will be collected from the Norwegian Patient Registry and the Norwegian Cause of Death Registry in June 2020.

Conditions

• Acute Admitted Multimorbid Patients

Interventions

BEHAVIORAL

multidisciplinary treatment

The pharmacist will conduct medication reconciliation at admission, perform medication reviews during the hospital stay and provide drug information (written and oral) to the patient before discharge, as well as written drug information to the next level of care

Sponsors & Collaborators

• Hospital Pharmacy Enterprise, South Eastern Norway

  collaborator OTHER

• South-Eastern Norway Regional Health Authority

  collaborator OTHER

• University of Oslo

  collaborator OTHER

• Oslo University Hospital

  lead OTHER

Principal Investigators

• Morten Mowe, Associate professor · Oslo University Hospital

Study Design

Allocation

RANDOMIZED

Purpose

HEALTH_SERVICES_RESEARCH

Masking

NONE

Model

PARALLEL

Eligibility

Min Age

18 Years

Sex

ALL

Healthy Volunteers

No

Timeline & Regulatory

Start

2014-08-31

Primary Completion

2018-07-06

Completion

2020-06-30

Countries

• Norway

Study Locations