INTRODUCTION Patients with complex medical care needs often embark on multiple care transitions over an extended period of time. As these patients or their caregivers often become the chief source of communication for complex medical situations, each transition can create an opportunity for health care errors. Combining the efforts of the established departments of Chronic Care Coordination (CC...

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE Approximately 9000 people in the UK are affected by Huntington's disease (HD). People with HD require ongoing health and social care support. There is a knowledge gap about costs of health and social care use associated with HD in the UK. This paper estimates the economic cost in the UK. METHODS Data on UK patients for the year 2013 were extracted from the European Hunt...

Background Globally, the population of older people is on the rise. As families are burdened with the high cost of care for aging members, demand is increasing for medical care and nursing homes. Thus, medication management is crucial to ensure that residents in a care center benefit and assist the management of the care center in reducing the burden of health care. This study is aimed to quali...

BACKGROUND With the increase of the proportion of old (>80 years), frail people living in long-term care settings, concern about the quality of medication management processes in nursing homes is growing. OBJECTIVES To characterize the organization of medication management processes in Belgian nursing homes. METHOD This cross-sectional, observational study of a representative sample of 76 B...

STUDY OBJECTIVE To assess the impact of a pilot pharmacist-managed medication reconciliation program on mortality and use of health care services in patients discharged to home from a skilled nursing facility (SNF). DESIGN Quasi-experimental, controlled trial. SETTING Health maintenance organization (HMO). PATIENTS Five hundred twenty-one HMO members. INTERVENTION Patients were assigned...

Self-care and self-medication practices are essential components of any health care systems. The use of over-the-counter (OTC) medications is a part of the self-medication process. The popularity of OTC medication use among patients may increase the abuse potential of OTC medications. With pharmacists being as accessible as they are, they are often the first line of contact for patients, and ha...

Introduction: Self-medication is one of the problems in the treatment cycle of patients. Aging is associated with increased drug use and adverse effects. The purpose of this study was to assess the factors influencing self-medication among the elderly referring to urban health centers in Khorramabad, Iran, based on the Health Belief Model (HBM) in 2016-2017.  Methods: This cross-section...

BACKGROUND Optimal medication management requires an effective relationship between the patient and health care professional. As pharmacists move from the traditional dispensing role to become more actively involved in patient care, factors influencing their relationship with patients need to be identified. A better understanding of these factors will facilitate more effective relationships. ...

Medication errors have important effects on increased length of hospitalization, increased mortality and costs. We assessed the incidence of medication errors and characterize the error types in an emergency department in a large teaching hospital in Tehran. We also investigated the effect of Emergency Department pharmacists on patient safety with regard to recovery of potentially harmful m...