|  Several of the papers in the latest issue of the IJPP investigate
services to women from community pharmacies.
Researchers from Queen’s University Belfast report an assessment
of the provision of advice on issues specific to women’s health.
They sent a postal questionnaire to a sample of 600 community pharmacists
to assess attitudes, perceived knowledge, confidence and embarrassment
in providing such advice.
The pharmacists were found to have positive attitudes. The majority gave
advice on a daily basis and most reported being confident and knowledgeable
on women’s health issues. (The authors did not validate self-assessed
knowledge and so cannot comment on the quality of advice given.)
Most respondents said they did not find it embarrassing to discuss women’s
health issues, but they felt more comfortable responding to, rather than
initiating, such discussions. “Pharmacists may need help to develop
skills and confidence in initiating discussions on women’s health
topics,” the researchers comment.
Articles in March issue of IJPP
· An evaluation of the contribution of the medical admissions
pharmacist at a London teaching hospital
(D. Brady and B. Dean Franklin)
· Assessment of patient satisfaction with pharmaceutical services
in a Nigerian teaching hospital
(A. C. Oparah, E. F. O. Enato and O. A. Akoria)
· A dictation system for reporting prescribing errors
in community pharmacies
(A. G. Kennedy and
B. Littenberg)
· Impact of pharmacist consultation versus a decision
aid on decision-making regarding hormone replacement therapy
(M. A. Deschamps,
J. G. Taylor,
S. L. Neubauer, S. Whiting and K. Green)
· Pharmacists’ role in improving awareness about folic acid:
a pilot study on the process of introducing an intervention in
pharmacy practice
(W. M. Meijer, D. J. de Smit, R. A. Jurgens,
L. T. W. de Jong-van den Berg)
· Advice provision for women: community pharmacists’ attitudes
and skills
(D. P. McAree and
E. M. Scott)
· The work of Michel Foucault: relevance to pharmacy
practice
(K. Ryan, P. Bissell and J. Morgall
Traulsen) |
Ensuring privacy for discussion on potentially sensitive topics was the
strategy most frequently used to put the customer at ease, although only
one-third of respondents had a private consultation area.
There were gender differences, with male pharmacists considering themselves
less confident, less knowledgeable, and more embarrassed discussing sensitive
issues than female pharmacists.
Women’s awareness about folic acid
From the Netherlands, researchers report on a project to improve women’s
awareness about folic acid. Four community pharmacies took part. Each
set up a core team (one pharmacist and one or two technicians) responsible
for organising the intervention in their pharmacy. As a minimum, pharmacy
staff added a label about folic acid to dispensed packs of oral contraceptives
(“Are you thinking of having a baby? Ask for information about
folic acid in your pharmacy”) and handed out leaflets about folic
acid. Other interventions in some pharmacies included window displays,
and the use of staff badges to encourage people to ask questions.
The project was undertaken in a series of cycles: action was implemented
and then the core teams met to discuss how they had got on and whether
modifications were needed. Following some negative responses, two pharmacies
decided to distribute the leaflet only to women aged under 43 years.
A questionnaire survey showed that most women were positive or neutral
about the label. Over half said that they appreciated the public health
information given through the pharmacy.
The authors say that the team approach was successful in implementing
practice change: the pharmacy staff valued the contact with the other
core teams and the fact that they were able to work together to find
solutions to problems that arose. Admissions pharmacist
A growing area of hospital practice is the provision of pharmacy services
to medical admission units, the aim being to detect and resolve drug-related
problems as soon as possible. A medical admissions pharmacist has been
in post at Chelsea and Westminster Hospital, London, since 2001.
To evaluate the contribution of this pharmacist, a comparison has been
made of interventions made under the previous ward pharmacy service (which
involved a daily visit to the unit) with those made after
employment of the full-time admissions pharmacist.
With the new arrangement, there were more interventions and, overall,
interventions were classed as being of greater clinical significance.
This was attributed in large part to the pharmacist’s attendance
on post-admission ward rounds.
One of the roles of the admissions pharmacist is to confirm patients’ medication
histories. The value of this was shown in a separate investigation of
medication history accuracy: 12 per cent of the patients’ regular
medicines were found to have been unintentionally omitted and 6 per cent
of prescriptions had been unintentionally changed. IJPP online
The IJPP is available online via Ingenta.com. The full text is only
available to online or print/online subscribers. Print-only subscribers
and non-subscribers
can purchase papers online on a “pay per view” basis. Abstracts
are available free of charge to all users. Further information is available
here |
The
Pharmaceutical Journal