[Medication counselling and support with individual medication preparation for trail elderly living at home-preliminary results].

Abstract

Background Medication safety and adherence are important aspects of quality of life, especially for frail elderly in our society. However, many elderly living at home may experience difficulties when taking their medication, and are therefore at risk for medication- related problems. The current living lab was implemented within the framework of the Flanders Care Living Labs and set the objective to develop a care pathway to improve medication safety and adherence for elderly living at home. Automated Individual Medication Preparation [IMP] was provided by a community-pharmacist in order to support frail elderly in taking their medication more correctly and thereby improving adherence. Methods In a before and after study, each patient was supported for 13 weeks through a multidisciplinary care pathway. Key in this pathway was the shared medication schedule (between GP and pharmacist) as the starting point for IMP and medication counselling. The increased medication support based on IMP was evaluated in frail elderly (age a 65 years, complex medication scheme a 5 medicines and a 3 intakes / day) before and after the study, by measuring adherence and satisfaction with counselling and repackaging the medication in sachets. Results The preliminary results of the current study showed that the self-reported adherence rate in frail elderly was significantly higher (p <0.05) after implementation of the pharmacists' intervention with automated IMP. At the end of the study every patient indicated that the repackaging of the medication by dose was helpful in order to take their medication correctly. Conclusion Increased medication counselling with IMP by the community-pharmacist may be a useful aid and supporting tool for frail elderly living at home with a complex medication scheme.