Jan 24, 2021
                       

Supporting Patients to Make Best Use of Their Medicines

supporting_patients_to_make_best_use_of_their_medicines

This WUN research group responds to the international priority area of safe and effective medicine use, under the umbrellas of patient safety and quality use if medicines.

Medicines are the most common intervention in health systems in the developed world, but their safe and effective use is far from being assured. Medicines are the most common form of harm in health systems. Only 50-70% of people take their long-term medicines as prescribed, jeopardizing potential positive health outcomes.

Our research promotes increased patient involvement in decisions about their medicines to improve safe and effective use.

The main themes of the collaborative research are:

  • Consumer medicines information – how it can be improved and tested to ensure it is fit for purpose. Current research is looking at tailored information and increasing the amount of ‘benefit’ information in patient leaflets; optimising dispensed prescription medicine labels; and improving written medicines information for consumers and healthcare professionals.
  • Medicines reconciliation at the hospital interface – a taxonomy has been developed, and qualitative work is planned to explore the patient journey from home to hospital and back.

Selected outcomes

  • Three completed PhD students, from the University of Sydney (Parisa Aslani), with associate supervisor from the University of Leeds (DK Theo Raynor)

    15 Publications:

  1. Jay E, Aslani P, Raynor DK (2011) User testing of Consumer Medicine Information in Australia Health Education Journal 70(4) pp420-427 doi:10.1177/0017896910376131
  2. Dickinson R, Hamrosi K, Knapp P, Aslani P, Sowter J, Krass I, Raynor D, (2013) Suits you? A qualitative study exploring preferences regarding the tailoring of consumer medicines information International Journal of Pharmacy Practice 21(4): pp207-215
  3. Hamrosi K, Dickinson R, Knapp P, Raynor D, Krass I, Sowter J, Aslani P (2013) It’s for your benefit: Exploring patients’ opinions about the inclusion of textual and numerical benefit information in medicine leaflets International Journal of Pharmacy Practice 21(4): pp216-225
  4. Hamrosi K, Raynor DKT, Aslani P (2014) Pharmacist, general practitioner and consumer use of written medicine information in Australia: are they on the same page? Research in Social Administrative Pharmacy, 10(4) pp 656-668
  5. Hamrosi K, Raynor DKT, Aslani P (2014) Beyond needs and expectations: Identifying the barriers and facilitators to written medicine information provision and use in Australia  Health Expectations 17(2):220-231 doi: 10.1111/j.1369-7625.2011.00753.x Published online 06/03/2012
  6. Tong V, Raynor DK, Aslani P (2014) Design, content and comprehensibility of over-the-counter (OTC) product labels and leaflets. International Journal of Clinical Pharmacy 36(5) pp865-72. DOI: 10.1007/s11096-014-9975-0
  7. Hamrosi K, Raynor DK, Aslani P (2014) Enhancing provision of written medicine information in Australia: pharmacist, general practitioner and consumer perceptions of the barriers and facilitators. BMC Health Services Research 14 pp183
  8. Tong V, Raynor DK, Blalock SJ, Aslani P (2015) Consumer understanding of medication risk information- implications for risk communication strategies Patient Preference and Adherence 9: pp983-988. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.2147/PPA.S86414
  9. Tong V, Raynor DK, Hamrosi KK, Acharya B, Panchal N, Aslani P (2016) Consumer opinions on existing and proposed Australian over-the-counter medicine labelling standardisation strategies in comparison with the U.S. Drug Facts label Therapeutic Innovation and Regulatory Science Epub ahead of print 09 February 2016. doi:10.1177/2168479016628301 50(4): 427-435
  10. Tong V, Raynor DK, Aslani P (2016) ‘It’s all there in black and white’- or is it? Consumer perspectives on the proposed Australian ‘Medicine Information Box’ over-the-counter label format Health Expectations 19(4) pp:948-961 doi: 10.1111/hex.12389.
  11. Tong V, Raynor DK, Blalock SJ, Aslani P (2016) Exploring consumer opinions on the presentation of side-effects information in Australian Consumer Medicine Information leaflets. Health Expectations 19(3):543–556. doi:10.1111/hex.12215
  12. Tong V, Raynor DK, Aslani P. (2017) User testing as a method for identifying how consumers say they would act on information related to over-the-counter medicines. Research in Social and Administrative Pharmacy 13(3):476-484 doi: 10.1016/j.sapharm.2016.06.001
  13. Tong V, Raynor DK, Aslani P (2018) Comparative user testing of Australian and UK over-the-counter labels and leaflets for diclofenac. Therapeutic Innovation and Regulatory Science 52(1), 38–48. https://doi.org/10.1177/2168479017711730
  14. Tong V, Raynor DK, Aslani P (2018) Developing alternative over-the-counter medicine label formats: How do they perform when evaluated by consumers? Research in Social and Administrative Pharmacy 14(3):pp248-61. doi: 10.1016/j.sapharm.2017.03.003.
  15. Tong V, Raynor DK, Aslani P. (2018) Receipt and use of spoken and written over-the-counter medicine information: insights into Australian and UK consumers’ experiences. International Journal of Pharmacy Practice. 26(2):129-137. doi: 10.1111/ijpp.12382

Academic Leads

Professor Parisa Aslani

WUN Research Team

  • University of Leeds

External Partners

  • University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, USA