None listed
Conditions
Brief summary
Based on a pilot study conducted in England the New Medicines Service (NMS) was introduced under the NHS community pharmacy contract in the UK in October 2011 as an “Advanced Service” to provide support for people newly prescribed a medicine for a chronic condition including: asthma/chronic obstructive pulmonary disease; type 2 diabetes; hypertension; and conditions requiring antiplatelet/anticoagulant therapy. The primary aim of the service is to improve medicines adherence and a randomised controlled trial demonstrated that the service was effective at improving patients’ adherence to their new medicine by 10%. NPS MedicineWise piloted this service to determine how it could be adapted for delivery in Australia and integrated into the workflow of community pharmacy. Evaluation of the pilot demonstrated that implementation in pharmacies across Australia is feasible and that the service was valued by both pharmacists and consumers. Following the successful pilot, this service is now being extended to a larger number of pharmacies. It aims to improve health outcomes by increasing patient adherence to new medicines for chronic conditions. This second phase will explore the ability to scale the service up to a larger number of pharmacies and measure consumer adherence to newly prescribed medicines through a randomised controlled trial.
Interventions
The intervention is the delivery of the New Medicine Support Service by pharmacists. Intervention patients will receive up to two telephone or face-to-face consultations (determined by patient preference) with a pharmacist over 4 weeks who will assess patient adherence to their new medicine; identify any medicines related problems; establish any support the patient may need; and answer any questions the patient may have about their new medicine. In some cases a patient will only receive one co
The intervention is the delivery of the New Medicine Support Service by pharmacists. Intervention patients will receive up to two telephone or face-to-face consultations (determined by patient preference) with a pharmacist over 4 weeks who will assess patient adherence to their new medicine; identify any medicines related problems; establish any support the patient may need; and answer any questions the patient may have about their new medicine. In some cases a patient will only receive one consultation if at the first consultation the pharmacist deems it necessary to refer the patient back to their GP. Consultations will generally take approximately 15 minutes and take place at approximately 2 and 4 weeks after dispensing of the patient's new medicine (study registration).
Sponsors
NPS MedicineWise
Study design
Allocation
Randomised controlled trial
Intervention model
Parallel
Primary purpose
Educational / counselling / training
Masking
Blinded (masking used) (Subject)
Eligibility
Sex/Gender
All
Age
18 Years to No maximum
Healthy volunteers
No
Inclusion criteria
To be included in the study patients must meet the following criteria: * Be aged 18 years or above; * Be a Medicare and/or Department of Veterans affairs (DVA) card holder; * Be living at home in a community setting; * Be on a newly prescribed medicine for one of the following conditions: – Asthma and other lung conditions such as COPD – Conditions requiring antiplatelet / anticoagulant therapy – Depression – Dyslipidaemia – Hypertension – Type 2 diabetes * Be able to understand and willing to consent to the study.
Exclusion criteria
- Patient cannot communicate sufficiently in English. - Patients of public or private hospitals, day hospital facilities, transitional care facilities or to residents of an Aged Care facility. - Patients who are collecting medicine where the only change from the previous medicine involves a dosage, strength, brand or formulation change(s).
Outcome results
None listed