Citation

Sperling S, Neal K, Hales K, Adams D, Frey D. Home Health Care Serv. Q. 2005; 24(1-2): 13-28.

Affiliation

Home Care Pharmacy, 450 Spring Street, Suite 11, Long Beach, CA 90806, USA. ssperling@memorialcare.org

Copyright

(Copyright © 2005, Informa - Taylor and Francis Group)

DOI

unavailable

PMID

16236656

Abstract

This paper describes the implementation of a medication management model within a medical-center based home health agency. The model was integrated into the agency's quality improvement falls prevention program and was selected in part because it directly addressed two medication-related accreditation standards for home health care agencies. During a five-month period, a staff pharmacist conducted medication reviews for 228 HHA patients who met the program's inclusion criteria. Thirty-three percent of these patients required some type of follow-up to resolve potential medication-related problems. By far, falls were the most common reason for referral, with 71 patients, or 30% of all participating patients, referred to the pharmacist due to a recent fall. From a quality improvement standpoint, the program met and even exceeded expectations in that it enabled staff to identify a serious threat to patient safety-medication-related problems, especially falls--and gave them the tools to resolve these potential problems.