Impact of clinical pharmacy services in a short stay unit of a hospital emergency department in Qatar

Background The presence of a clinical pharmacist in a hospital's Emergency Department (ED) is important to decrease the potential for medication errors. To our knowledge, no previous studies have been conducted to evaluate the impact of implementing clinical pharmacy services in the ED in Qatar. Objective To characterize the contributions of clinical pharmacists in a short stay unit of ED in order to implement and scale-up the service to all ED areas in the future. Methods A retrospective study conducted for 7 months in the ED of Hamad General Hospital, Qatar. The intervention recommendations were made by clinical pharmacists to the physician in charge during medical rounds. Results A total of 824 documented pharmacist recommendations were analyzed. The interventions included the following: Providing information to the physician (24.4 %) and recommending medication discontinuation (22.0 %), dose adjustment (19.3 %), medication addition (16.0 %), changes in frequency of medications (7.6 %), medication resumption (5.7 %), and patient education (5.0 %). Conclusion Clinical pharmacists in the ED studied play an important role in patient care.