PRACTICAL UTILITY OF DIFFERENT SYSTEMS FOR CLASSIFYING DRUGRELATED PROBLEMS (DRPs): ASSESSMENT BY HOSPITAL PHARMACISTS.

Encuentro; 1ª Reunión Internacional de Ciencias Farmacéuticas; 2010

PRACTICAL UTILITY OF DIFFERENT SYSTEMS FOR CLASSIFYING DRUGRELATED
PROBLEMS (DRPs): ASSESSMENT BY HOSPITAL PHARMACISTS.
Armando P1a, Fontana Db, Uema Sb, Vega EMb
aDepartament of Pharmacology, bDepartament of Pharmacy. School of Chemical Sciences, National
University of Córdoba.
Haya de la Torre y Medina Allende s/n, Ciudad Universitaria, Córdoba (Argentina) CP: 5000
INTRODUCTION
There are different classifications of DRPs with different focus (1). Both documenting and classifying
DRPs are essential to improve the process of medication?s use. In practice, professionals need a patientoriented
base to implement pharmaceutical interventions (1-6).
Hospital Pharmacy Specialization (HPS) is a postgraduate career at the School of Chemical Sciences,
National University of Córdoba (FCQ-UNC). Most of the HPS students are working in health-system
pharmacies. One of the modules included the concept of DRPs and different classification systems.
The objectives of this work are:
? To assess the different DRPs classification systems through 4 clinical cases/examples resolved/classified
by pharmacists taking the HPS (FCQ-UNC).
? To analyze the opinions of participating pharmacists in relation to the focus and relevance of the
different DRPs classification systems.
MATERIALS AND METHODS
In the frame of module ?Pharmaceutical Care I? (HPS), a workshop intended to identify and classify
DRPs was planned. Four clinical cases with one DRP each (or DRP risk) were presented to six working
groups of four pharmacists each. As few classifications have an official name, brief titles have been
assigned, usually referring to the originating organization or researcher(s).
The groups resolved the cases by consensus using 4 classification systems: ASHP (7), 2nd Granada
Consensus (8), PCNE V 5.01 (9) and Cipolle/Morley/Strand (10). Ideally, one type of DRP was expected
by case according to each system (1,2). An average number of categories assigned by case was obtained.
In addition, the groups were requested to assess the focus and practical utility of the DRPs classification
systems (1,2). A 5 points Likert scale was used from ?totally agree? to ?completely disagree?. For focus
assessment ?completely disagree? was related to technical aspects while ?totally agree? was associated to
a patient-oriented process.
For statistical analysis SPSS 15.0 software was used.
RESULTS
Twenty four pharmacists discussed the DRPs classification systems during the workshop. Main outcomes
are shown in Table 1.
CONCLUSIONS
A comparison among different DRPs classification systems was carried out (1,2,3). Whereas an ideal
classification system should identify uniquely a given DRP (1), Cipolle/Morley/Strand and 2nd Granada
Consensus seem to be better than the other systems (11). Moreover, both of them obtain high scores in the
focus and practical utility assessments.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
To Dr. María Eugenia Olivera (HPS director) and to all pharmacists from working groups.
REFERENCES
1. van Mil JW, Westerlund LO, Hersberger KE, Schaefer MA. Drug-Related Problem Classification
Systems. Ann Pharmacother. 2004;38(5):859-67.
2. Björkman IK, Sanner MA, Bernsten CB. Comparing 4 classification systems for drug-related
problems: processes and functions. Res Social Adm Pharm 2008;4(4):320-31.
3. Björkman IK, Bernsten CB, Sanner MA. Care ideologies reflected in 4 conceptions of pharmaceutical
care. Res Social Adm Pharm 2008;4(4):332-42.
4. Lampert M, Kraehenbuehl S, Hug B. Drug-related problems: evaluation of a classification system in
the daily practice of a Swiss University Hospital. Pharm World Sci 2008;30:768-76.


1 Corresponding author. Tel +54 351 4334437, fax +54 351 4334420; e-mail: parman@fcq.unc.edu.ar