The Missing Link: Evolving Accessibility To Formulary-Related Information

Formulary management is a key component to ensuring the safe, effective, and fiscally responsible use of medications for health systems. One challenge in the formulary management process is making the most relevant formulary information easily accessible to practitioners involved in medication therapy decisions at the point of care. In September 2014, Froedtert and the Medical College of Wisconsin (F&MCW) implemented a commercial formulary management tool (CFMT) to improve accessibility to the recently aligned health-system formulary. The CFMT replaced an internally developed formulary management tool.

The primary objective was to determine pharmacist end-user satisfaction with accessibility to system formulary and formulary-related information through a new CMFT compared with the historical formulary management tool (HFMT). The secondary objective was to measure the use of formulary-related information in the CFMT and HFMT.

The primary objective was measured through pharmacist end-user satisfaction surveys before and after integration of formulary-related information into the CFMT. The secondary objective was measured by comparing monthly usage reports for the CFMT with monthly usage reports for the HFMT.

Survey respondents reported being satisfied (52.5%) or very satisfied (18.8%) more frequently with the CFMT compared with the HFMT (31.7% satisfied and 2.5% very satisfied). Between October 2014 and January 2015 the frequency of access to formulary-related information increased from 92 to 104 requests per day through the CFMT and decreased from 47 to 33 requests per day through the HFMT.

Initial data suggest incorporating system formulary-related information and related resources into a single platform increases pharmacist end-user satisfaction and overall use of formulary-related information.