The “Activities Characterizing Clinical Pharmacists (ACCP) Study (ACCP2 Study)” was developed on the basis of the observation that in clinical trials assessing pharmacist practices, we are often unsure whether the protocols describing clinical care are strictly adhered to. Furthermore, it is often difficult to disambiguate which aspects of a complex intervention produced the benefits observed in a trial evaluating the clinical pharmacy service. The goal of the study is to create a tool designed specifically to document the care actually delivered to an individual patient, especially in settings where the pharmacist makes up part of a team and does not practice independently.
When assessing clinical pharmacy services in clinical trials, we typically provide training to pharmacists to “standardize” the intervention, but rarely do we observe the pharmacist in practice. It is not surprising that there is often huge variation in the outcomes of clinical trials evaluating pharmacist service.
The PBRN recently completed the first phase of the qualitative portion of a mixed methods study by interviewing clinical pharmacists practicing in inpatient internal medicine and outpatient family medicine or internal medicine practices. Several practices were selected to provide input in this step of the process.
The next phase of the mixed methods approach will include a series of focus groups involving pharmacists from geographically diverse locations. The first set of focus groups was held in conjunction with the 2012 Annual Meeting. From these sessions, we will identify important factors, or themes, common to pharmacist practice.
This information will be used to build a tool that clinicians can use to reliably and consistently describe the activities of clinical pharmacist practices. The tool will first be used in a study of PBRN-affiliated practices, likely in early 2013. For more information about the ACCP2 Study, please contact us at [email protected].