Medicines and patient safety: elderly and other vulnerable patients

Summary from start. Post.Doc. «Pharmacoeconomics» was employed on the project from September 1st 2010 to August 31th 2012. Her focus was ?generic substitution? related to misuse of medicines and in relation to immigrants. During the period she published 4 papers in international journals, gave two talks at international conferences, presented posters on one international and one national conference and gave 6 talks and a seminar nationally. Ph.D.student «Herbal medicines» has published two papers in international journals and one in a national journal. Her focus is use of herbal remedies during pregnancy and treatment of nausea and vomiting in pregnancy. She has given one talk at an international conference and 8 talks nationally. In addition she has presented posters on one international and one national conference. Her work has been in media twice. She has been co-supervisor for 3 master students in her area of interest. Ph.D.student «Elderly» has published one paper in an international journal. Her focus is treatment of diabetes in nursing homes. She has given two talks at international conferences and 9 talks nationally and she has presented a poster on a national conference. Her work has been in media twice. Post.Doc. «Elderly» has published one paper in an international journal and 3 in national journals. Her focus is on diabetes, treatment and measurement of blood glucose. She has given 3 talks at international conferences and 8 talks nationally. Her work has been in media three times. She is co-supervisor for Ph.D.student «Elderly» and for another Ph.D.student in nursing home medicine. She is a co-organiser in two ?learning networks? and a seminar group in nursing home medicine. She has supervised 3 master students during the last year and established collaboration in nursing home medicine with the University of East Anglia, Norwich, UK. To do this she has applied for and been given grants from ?Småforsk? and ?SPIRE? at the University of Bergen.

The project plan entails a research strategy to be conducted by a research group in social pharmacy and pharmacy practice in collaboration with several research institutions on the Western Health Region of Norway, at the University of Oslo and the Univers ity of Groeningen. The research project is built on two substudies (elderly, herbal medicines), with medicines and patient safety as the common denominator. The objectives of the project as a whole is: - to make the use of medicines safer and more eff ective for vulnerable patients - improving the health of patients through health services research -focusing on the use of medicines by individuals and by society. -to utilize pharmacoeconomic methodology in regard to prescribing quality and pharmaceutic al intervention, and to analyze how this affects patient safety. The most critical R&D challenges are: -To develop valid methods to study medicines and patient safety in different health care settings. -To promote inter-professional dialogue regarding e lderly and medicines. -To estimate pharmacoeconomic costs and health benefits of pharmaceutical interventions. The anticipated application potential of the project findings: The study of medicines and safety in vulnerable patients groups has many appli cation potentials. By improving prescribing quality and through pharmacoeconomic assessments, our efforts may reduce the risk of medication errors and promote a more rational use of the governmental health budget.