Pharmacists’ assessments before dispensing older people’s medications: a descriptive study

OBJECTIVES: This study aims to explore pharmacists' assessments before dispensing medicines for older people. METHODS: The medications of 292 older primary care patients, assessed by two physicians in consensus in a previous study, were independently assessed by two experienced community pharmacists in a hypothetical dispensing scenario. KEY FINDINGS: The pharmacists determined that medications for 174 and 133 patients, respectively, required action before dispensing. In 36 cases, both considered physician contact was required. Of those, 35 cases were due to interaction alerts, and 13 of the cases merited related actions according to the physicians. CONCLUSIONS: Every other medication list of older patients requires pharmacist action before dispensing, most often due to interaction alerts and some meriting medical action.