Perceived value of ward-based pharmacists from the perspective of physicians and nurses.

BACKGROUND: Clinical pharmacy in a hospital setting is relatively new in Sweden. Its recent introduction at the University Hospital in Uppsala has provided an opportunity for evaluation by other relevant professionals of the integration of clinical pharmacists into the health-care team.

OBJECTIVES: The objectives of this descriptive study were to evaluate the perceived value of wardbased clinical pharmacists from the perspective of hospital based physicians and nurses and to identify potential advantages and disadvantages related to the new inter professional collaboration. Another objective was to evaluate the experiences of general practitioners on receiving medication reports from ward-based clinical pharmacists.

SETTING: Two acute internal medicine wards at the University Hospital in Uppsala, where a previously reported randomized controlled trial investigating the effects of ward based clinical pharmacists on re-visits to hospital was undertaken.

METHODS: Data were collected by questionnaires containing closed- and open-ended questions. The questionnaires were distributed during the nine-month study period of the randomized controlled trial by an independent researcher to 29 hospital-based physicians and 44 nurses on the study wards and to 21 general practitioners who had received two or more medication reports. Answers were analysed descriptively for the closed-ended questions and by content analysis for the open-ended questions.

MAIN OUTCOME MEASURE: The main outcome measure was the physicians' and nurses' level of satisfaction with the new collaboration with clinical pharmacists, from a hospital and primary care perspective.

RESULTS: Seventy-six percent of the hospital-based physicians and 81% of the nurses completed the questionnaire. Ninety-five percent of the physicians and 93% of the nurses were very satisfied with the collaboration. Out of the 17 general practitioners (81%) that completed the questionnaire 71% wanted to continue to receive medication reports in a similar way in the future. Increased patient safety and improvements in patients' drug therapy were the main advantages stated by all three groups of respondents. Eighteen percent of the hospital-based physicians and 21% of the nurses thought that the collaboration had been time-consuming to certain or to a high extent.

CONCLUSIONS: The majority of the respondents, both GPs and hospital based physicians and nurses, were satisfied with the new collaboration with the ward based pharmacists and perceived that the quality of the patients' drug therapy and drug-related patient safety had increased.