Impact of Systematic Assessment and Monitoring Services on Health Outcomes in COPD Patients

Abstract

The present study was designed to measure the impact Systematic Assessment and Monitoring Services program led by a clinical pharmacist on a wide range of clinical and humanistic outcomes in patients with Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). The results were encouraging and reveal that intervention patients improved dramatically when compared with control patients. The pharmacist can play a critical role in counseling patients on how to quit smoking and providing support as well as information on smoking cessation products. As a most accessible healthcare professional, clinical pharmacists should be more involved in smoking cessation activities and play a major role in disease prevention and health promotion of the whole country. In summary, clinical pharmacist can significantly improve the quit rates by providing smoking cessation behavioral counseling and encouraging the patients to join Stop Smoking Services. Correctness of inhaler use technique is critical in achieving treatment goals in patients with Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). In a country like India where literacy level is still below the benchmark, face-to-face education and demonstration is crucial to attain good inhaler use technique. Our study proved that simply providing the patients with pictorial pamphlets regarding inhaler use technique is not enough and a novel educational strategy has to be developed and implemented similar to SAD protocol all over the country to effectively manage COPD patients. This study also emphasizes that monitoring of patient s inhaler use skills periodically and providing reminder flags in addition to educating them is much warranted. Providing inhaler technique flags, highlighting the critical steps is a simple and effective intervention that can be implemented in community pharmacies and hospitals across the country to improve COPD outcomes. We believe that, our study strongly endorses expanding the pharmacists role, an economically viable strategy for resource-poor nations like India.