Pharmacists play an important role in ensuring medicine safety and appropriate use of medicines. Our research develops and tests the effectiveness of new pharmacy practices in improving patient outcomes.
Reducing Medicine Induced Deterioration and Adverse Reactions (ReMInDAR) trial
Many medicines have adverse effects which are difficult to detect and frequently go unrecognised. The ReMInDAR trial, tested whether regular pharmacist visits to people living in aged care, with the purpose of monitoring for signs and symptoms of medicine side effects would prevent harms. The pharmacists used validated tools to identify side effects, including looking for changes in a person’s strength, by assessing hand grip strength, changes in cognition, by assessing cognitive function, and changes in physical activity. We found the pharmacist service did stop people’s cognition from deteriorating.
Thank you to all the aged-care residents and staff, pharmacists and stakeholders who participated in this trial.
