PT  - JOURNAL ARTICLE
AU  - Al-Jazairi, Abdulrazaq S.
AU  - Al-Agil, Amal A.
AU  - Asiri, Yousif A.
AU  - Al-Kholi, Tariq A.
AU  - Akhras, Nathem S.
AU  - Horanieh, Bashar K.
TI  - The impact of clinical pharmacist in a cardiac-surgery intensive care unit
DP  - 2008 Feb 01
TA  - Saudi Medical Journal
PG  - 277--281
VI  - 29
IP  - 2
4099  - http://smj.org.sa/content/29/2/277.short
4100  - http://smj.org.sa/content/29/2/277.full
SO  - Saudi Med J2008 Feb 01; 29
AB  - OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the clinical pharmacists' interventions in an intensive care unit (ICU) setting with regard to their acceptance by the medical team, frequency, clinical significance, and targeted patient's outcomes.METHODS: This is a prospective, non-comparative, observational study evaluating the clinical pharmacist interventions in an ICU setting from December 2002 to May 2003. The study was conducted in a 19-bed Cardiac-Surgery ICU at King Faisal Specialist Hospital & Research Center, a tertiary-care hospital in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. The clinical pharmacist performed daily multi-disciplinary team rounds, with documentation of all his interventions. On the same day, a physician, who is a part of the team, verified all interventions for validity and clinical significance. The institutional Office of Research Affairs approved the study.RESULTS: The clinical pharmacist intervened 394 times on the 600 patients [0.66 intervention-per-patient]. The medical team accepted almost all interventions (94.3%). The main drug-related problems were the following: no drug prescribed for medical condition (33.2%), inappropriate dosing regimen (28.9%), and no indication for drug use (14.3%). Approximately 55.7% of the interventions targeted enhancing therapeutic outcomes, whilst 21.8% of interventions resulted in the prevention of an adverse drug reaction. The interventions that may have resulted in decreasing mortality, preventing, or reducing organ damage, or decreasing hospitalization, represented 8.1% of all interventions.CONCLUSION: Participation of a clinical pharmacist in the daily multidisciplinary team rounds in an ICU setting significantly reduces unfavorable morbidities and enhances therapeutic outcomes.