Quantitative evaluation of clinical pharmacy activities following implementation of an enhanced weekend service at a teaching hospital
Authors: Cheng C , Shah S , Samiei L , Kilic E , Patel S , Razouk R 
Published: November 2024

Introduction

Improving equity of staffing across seven-days is a strategic priority for the National Health Service (NHS).1 Development of enhanced weekend clinical pharmacy services presents opportunity to improve admission and discharge medicines reconciliation (MR), reduce medication error and increase patient counselling.2

At the study site, an enhanced weekend clinical pharmacy service was implemented in October 2021. The service was delivered 9am-5pm to all clinical specialities across 54 wards. Defined minimum staffing was 13 pharmacists and 2 medicines management pharmacy technicians (MMPT). Service specification included: clinical screen and order of medications; admission MR, review of high-risk patients (critical care patients and those prioritised by the weekday team); and discharge activities including patient counselling.

Aim

To evaluate provision of the enhanced weekend clinical pharmacy service post-implementation by quantification of shift fill and clinical pharmacy professional activities.

Methods

A quantitative study was conducted over two separate weekends one month and six months post-implementation (13th-14th November 2021 and 9-10th April 2022). Pharmacy professionals collected data using a paper activity tool validated for use at the study site. Interventions included rectification of medication error, medicines optimisation or consult. Data were collated in Microsoft Excel immediately after each study weekend. Simple descriptive statistics were performed in Microsoft Excel. The study was registered with KCH Pharmacy Research and Audit Group (07/2021), deemed service evaluation and ethics approval waived.

Results

Pharmacy professionals reviewed 1,056 patients over 3,645 occupied bed-days. Services were delivered by 13 pharmacists and 1 MMPT on weekend 1, 12 pharmacists and 1 MMPT on weekend 2. Data were collected for all wards on weekend 1; on weekend 2 activity data was not collected for five surgical wards (Saturday and Sunday), four post-acute medical wards (Saturday) and the acute medical unit (Sunday).

Admission MR was conducted for 77% (317/412) of newly-admitted patients. Pharmacists recommended prescription amendment for 68% (217/317) of patients receiving admissions MR; affecting 517 medicines. The recorded intervention rate per patient reviewed was 0.64 (680/1056). Pharmacy professionals responded to 211 queries from healthcare professionals (HCPs), undertook 90 incidences of pro-active HCP education and counselled 92 patients/carers. Pharmacists prepared discharge medication lists or clinically screened discharge prescriptions for 205 patients. A total of 952 non-stock medicines were ordered and 313 patients own medicines checked for suitability for reuse.

Discussion / Conclusion

These findings add to existing evidence for seven-day clinical pharmacy services. Defined minimum staffing was not fulfilled with 90% shift fill rate. Clear benefit was demonstrated in terms of admission MR and resultant intervention, HCP education, discharge and counselling activities. The percentage of patients with a recommended prescription amendment following admission MR matched findings from a separate service evaluation during February 2021 of an enhanced weekend service introduced at our study site during the COVID-19 pandemic (68%).3 The intervention rate for reviewed patients was also comparable (0.64 compared with 0.57 during COVID-19).3 Limitations include the relatively short period of data collection at a single-site which limits generalisability of findings. There were some gaps in data collection and acceptance rate of interventions was not collected.

References

1. Department of Health. 7-day NHS services: a factsheet [internet]. London; 2015. [cited 2024 Jun 4] Available from: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/7-day-nhs-services-a-factsheet/7-day-nhs-services-a-factsheet.

2. Reid L E M, Lone N I, Morrison Z J, Weir C J, Jones M C. The provision of seven day multidisciplinary staffing in Scottish acute medical units: a cross-sectional study, QJM, 2018 May;111(5):295–301, doi: 10.1093/qjmed/hcy024

3. Cheng C, Walsh A, Jones S, Matthews S, Weerasooriya D, Fernandes RJ et al. Development, implementation and evaluation of a seven-day clinical pharmacy service in a tertiary referral teaching hospital during surge-2 of the COVID-19 pandemic. Int J Clin Pharm. 2023 Apr;45(2):293-303. doi: 10.1007/s11096-022-01475-8