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SUMIT RAYBARDHAN, B.SC.(PHARM.), is Staff Pharmacist, Princess Margaret Hospital–University Health Network, Toronto, Ontario, Canada; at the time of this project he was a pharmacy resident, Pharmaceutical Sciences Clinical Service Unit, Vancouver Coastal Health, Vancouver General Hospital (VGH), Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. ROBERT M. BALEN, PHARM.D., is Informatics Coordinator, Pharmaceutical Sciences Clinical Service Unit, Vancouver Coastal Health, VGH, and Clinical Assistant Professor, Faculty of Pharmaceutical Sciences, University of British Columbia (UBC), Vancouver. NILUFAR PARTOVI, PHARM.D., FCSHP, is Clinical Coordinator, Pharmaceutical Sciences Clinical Service Unit, Vancouver Coastal Health, VGH, and Clinical Professor, Faculty of Pharmaceutical Sciences, UBC. PETER LOEWEN PHARM.D., FCSHP, is Clinical Coordinator, Pharmaceutical Sciences, Vancouver Coastal Health, University of British Columbia Hospital, and Clinical Assistant Professor, Faculty of Pharmaceutical Sciences, UBC. GWEN LIU, PHARM.D., is Drug Utilization Evaluation Pharmacist, Pharmaceutical Sciences Clinical Service Unit, Vancouver Coastal Health, VGH. PETER J. JEWESSON, PH.D., FCSHP, is Professor, Faculty of Pharmaceutical Sciences, UBC; at the time of this project he was Clinical Director, Pharmaceutical Sciences Clinical Service Unit, Vancouver Coastal Health, VGH.

Address correspondence to Dr. Balen at Pharmaceutical Sciences, Vancouver General Hospital, 855 W. 12 Avenue, Vancouver, BC V5Z 1M9, Canada (rbalen{at}interchange.ubc.ca).

Purpose. A scalable, multiuser, personal digital assistant (PDA)-based documentation tool for pharmacist collection of data on drug-related problems (DRPs) is described. Summary. A PDA-based tool for documenting DRPs and pharmacist interventions was developed with database software. Data fields were based on the pharmaceutical care model. PDA synchronization stations were configured to transmit encrypted data from three hospital sites to a central server. Pharmacists in a multisite health care organization were trained to use the documentation tool. Data were analyzed with commercially available software. Users’ opinions about the tool were solicited in a survey. Twenty-eight PDAs containing a 15-field database were issued to 39 pharmacists in 31 service areas. Data were successfully transmitted from all hospital sites over the existing corporate local area network. During a two-month period, 5084 DRPs were documented; 90% of them were resolved at the time of data entry. The most frequent types of DRPs were the need to add a drug (31%) and the ordering of an unnecessary drug (15%). Most pharmacists reported that the tool was easy to use, was well integrated with the workflow, and required less than 30 minutes per day for documenting DRPs. Conclusion. A PDA-based documentation tool was successfully used in a multisite health care organization to collect data on DRPs and document pharmacist interventions. Index terms: Computers; Documentation; Interventions; Pharmaceutical care; Pharmaceutical services; Pharmacists, hospital; Pharmacy, institutional, hospital; Technology; Toxicity

 

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