Deprescribing in Primary Health Care

Summary

Medications can help older adults but can also harm them. Frail older adults tend to have many health problems that require treatment, but are also at risk of harm from the medications prescribed. This makes it hard to get older adults the treatments they need and keep them safe from the harms from medications. It ends up that a lot of visits to emergency rooms and hospitals are due to medications, especially for older adults. Previous research has shown the benefits of stopping medications older adults no longer need. Even so, healthcare professionals do not always do this as well as they could. Our goal is to make a collection of resources for pharmacists who work with doctors and nurses in primary settings that will help support older adults as they safely stop medications that are no longer needed. The investigators will use knowledge and tools that are already known and published. In the first six months the team, which includes older adults and their families, pharmacists, doctors, nurses, and healthcare policymakers developed a framework and resource toolbox that pharmacists can use to help older adults stop medications that are no longer needed. In the remaining 10 months, the investigators will use the resource toolbox in primary healthcare teams and nursing homes. Overall, the investigators expect that by using the resources the pharmacists will be able to support patients stop medications they no longer need and help reduce the number of pills people take, reduce drug costs, reduce harms from medication use and improve quality of life for frail older adults and their loved ones.

Conditions

• Inappropriate Prescribing
• Primary Health Care
• Polypharmacy

Interventions

OTHER

Deprescribing toolbox and intervention

Pharmacist-led deprescribing plan with the patient which will include the patient's deprescribing goals. The intervention advocates for deprescribing according to recognized algorithms and guidelines which will be included in a resource toolbox/website.

Sponsors & Collaborators

• Dalhousie University

  collaborator OTHER

• Canadian Frailty Network

  collaborator OTHER

• Horizon Health Network

  collaborator OTHER

• Nova Scotia Health Authority

  lead OTHER

Principal Investigators

• Shanna Trennaman · Dalhousie University

Study Design

Allocation

NA

Purpose

HEALTH_SERVICES_RESEARCH

Masking

NONE

Model

SINGLE_GROUP

Eligibility

Sex

ALL

Healthy Volunteers

Yes

Timeline & Regulatory

Start

2019-04-26

Primary Completion

2022-06-08

Completion

2022-06-08

Countries

• Canada

Study Locations