Attitudes toward and factors affecting implementation of medication therapy management services by community pharmacists

Objective: To compare the attitudes of community pharmacy managers who did and did not contract with Mirixa to provide Medicare Part D medication therapy management (MTM) services in 2006. Design: Cross-sectional descriptive study. Setting: United States in 2006. Participants: 100 pharmacy managers contracted to provide MTM services in 2006 and 100 pharmacy managers not contracted to provide MTM services in 2006. Intervention: Telephone-administered survey of independent community pharmacy managers. Main outcome measures: Pharmacist knowledge of and attitudes toward Medicare Part D MTM services. Results: 200 pharmacy managers completed the study (n = 100 for each group). Pharmacists who contracted with Mirixa to provide MTM services in 2006 were more familiar with Medicare Part D MTM (80% vs. 59%, P = 0.001). Significantly more pharmacists contracted with Mirixa to provide MTM services agreed that they were qualified to provide MTM services (96% vs. 88%, P = 0.01) and strongly agreed that an annual personal medication review would benefit patient outcomes (59% vs. 45%, P = 0.04). No significant difference was found between groups with regard to other variables addressed in the survey. Conclusion: Results of this study suggest that familiarity with Medicare Part D MTM services was a key factor in whether pharmacists chose to contract to provide MTM in 2006. Additionally, significantly more pharmacists who contracted felt strongly that personal medication reviews would improve patient outcomes.