Precision of Medication Therapy Problem Identification and Classification amongst Primary Care Clinic Pharmacists

Area of Science:

• Pharmacy Practice
• Health Services Research

Background:

• Health systems are increasingly implementing comprehensive medication management (CMM) services.
• Pharmacist involvement in CMM requires accurate identification and classification of medication therapy problems (MTPs).

Purpose of the Study:

• To assess the agreement among pharmacists on identifying and classifying MTPs.
• To evaluate the consistency of MTP identification and categorization within a health system that recently adopted CMM services.

Main Methods:

• Twenty standardized case vignettes were developed and distributed to pharmacists.
• Pharmacists identified and categorized MTPs within each case.
• Agreement was measured using intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) and percent agreement.

Main Results:

• Moderate agreement (ICC=0.45) was found for the number of MTPs identified.
• Pharmacists achieved perfect agreement on the number of MTPs in about half of cases.
• Percent agreement for MTP identification (yes/no) and categorization was 73% or higher.

Conclusions:

• The study indicates a need for targeted training and education to improve pharmacist agreement on MTPs.
• Findings provide insights for refining CMM service implementation and pharmacist education strategies.