OBJECTIVE

To establish a community pharmacist-provided home health service to improve medication adherence and reduce 30-day heart failure-related hospital readmissions.

SETTING

Visiting Nurse Services of Newport and Bristol Counties located in Portsmouth, RI, from December 2013 to April 2014.

PRACTICE DESCRIPTION

Each patient received one in-home visit provided by a Postgraduate Year 1 community pharmacy resident within 1 week of admission to visiting nurse services followed by two follow-up telephone calls, 1 week and 4 weeks after the visit. The in-home visit consisted of a baseline assessment of medication adherence using the Morisky 8-Item Medication Adherence Questionnaire as well as pharmacist-provided education regarding chronic heart failure management. The follow-up telephone calls were used to reassess patient adherence and to monitor for hospital readmission within 30 days of the initial in-home visit.

PRACTICE INNOVATION

Community pharmacist-provided in-home medication reconciliation and medication teaching has not been described in the literature previously. In addition, pharmacists are often not included on home health care teams placing patients undergoing transitions in care at risk for potential medication-related errors.

MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES

Improvement in medication adherence and reduction in 30-day heart failure-related hospital readmission rates.

RESULTS

Ten patients were enrolled from December 2013 through April 2014. Following intervention, all patients saw improvements in adherence questionnaire scores during follow-up. Hospital readmission rates for patients seen by the pharmacist were lower compared with agencywide figures over a similar time period.

CONCLUSION

A community pharmacist-provided in-home medication teaching service for patients following recent hospital discharge helps facilitate successful transitions of care from an inpatient to outpatient setting, improves medication adherence and has produced lower observed 30-day heart failure-related hospital readmission rates. Expansion of this or a similar service within the community pharmacy to reach as many patients as possible, including those not using visiting nurse services, could serve to only augment these benefits.