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Many older adults with complex care needs live at home due to ageing‐in‐place policies. This study explored homecare workers' experiences and suggestions for improvements of care. Twelve semi-structured interviews were analyzed thematically, and revealed pride, capability, and satisfaction in their work, yet they feel undervalued and lack support. They advocate for integrated care models, recognition of their competence, flexible work approaches, and committed leadership. This would enhance patient care and address their own working conditions, addressing concerns from being relegated to the bottom of the hierarchy. They emphasize the need for comprehensive approaches, spanning from housekeeping to end-of-life palliative care. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Older individuals with functional decline and homecare are frequent visitors to emergency departments (ED). Homecare workers (HCWs) interact regularly with their clients and may play a crucial role in their well-being. Therefore, this study explores if and how HCWs perceive they may contribute to the prevention of ED visits among their clients. Methods: In this qualitative study, 12 semi-structured interviews were conducted with HCWs from Sweden between July and November 2022. Inductive thematic analysis was used to identify barriers and facilitators to prevent ED visits in older home-dwelling individuals. Results: HCWs want to actively contribute to the prevention of ED visits among clients but observe many barriers that hinder them from doing so. Barriers refer to care organisation such as availability to primary care staff and information transfer; perceived attitudes towards HCWs as co-workers; and client-related factors. Participants suggest that improved communication and collaboration with primary care and discharge information from the ED to homecare services could overcome barriers. Furthermore, they ask for support and geriatric education from primary care nurses which may result in increased respect towards them as competent staff members. Conclusions: HCWs feel that they have an important role in the health management of older individuals living at home. Still, they feel as an untapped resource in the prevention of ED visits. They deem that improved coordination and communication between primary care, ED, and homecare organisations as well as proactive care would enable them to add significantly to the prevention of ED visits. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: NHs have been severely exposed during the COVID‐19 pandemic. Little is known about how staff who provide practical daily care of older residents experienced work during the pandemic. The aim of this study was to understand how nursing assistants (NAs) experienced their work at nursing homes (NHs) for older people during the first wave of the COVID‐19 pandemic. Methods: We conducted a qualitative study of focus group discussions with in total 20 participants from four NHs in Stockholm, Sweden. Discussions were held in November 2020. Transcripts were analyzed using inductive thematic analysis. Results: We identified three major themes: 1) We felt abandoned, scared and disrespected, 2) We made sure we made it through, and 3) We can do good work with appropriate resources. NAs felt disregarded as they were often left alone without adequate support from managers, registered nurses and the municipalities. NAs felt distressed and guilty and developed their own strategies to cope and manage their work. Conclusion and Implication for Practice: During the first wave of the COVID‐19 pandemic NAs felt abandoned and burdened due to lack of leadership. Organizational improvements are required to protect the wellbeing of NAs and to ensure sustainability of patient safety. NAs are crucial in the care for vulnerable older people and their experiences should constitute a keystone for development of future policy and practice in NHs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: In Sweden, patients receiving Home Care (HC) are older people with frailty and multimorbidity, and are often treated with many medicines. Their perspectives on polypharmacy have been sparsely explored. Aim: To investigate HC patients' experiences and perceptions regarding polypharmacy. Design & setting: Semi-structured interviews with 17 patients with HC in Stockholm, Sweden. Method: The interview questions were open and aimed to encourage participants to speak freely about their personal experiences of living with polypharmacy. Data were analysed using an inductive thematic analysis. Results: The participants' median age was 83.5 years (range 74-97 years) and the median number of prescribed medicines was 11 (range 5-30). The following two themes were identified: (1) experiences from daily life with polypharmacy; and (2) dependency on the relationship to healthcare professionals. The first theme contains the main finding, which was the diversity in how older people experienced polypharmacy and how they coped with polypharmacy in everyday life. While some were satisfied despite having multiple medicines, others experienced such psychological unease owing to polypharmacy that it led to reduced quality of life. The second theme reflects the importance of the relationship between the older person and healthcare professionals for medicine-related ideas and attitudes. Conclusion: The individual variation in experiences regarding polypharmacy points to the value of interprofessional teamwork with the patient as an active partner. Therefore, healthcare professionals need to adapt a more person-centred approach where the patient's perspectives are respected and considered in medicine-related decisionmaking. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: Inappropriate use of medicines causes increased morbidity, mortality, adverse drug reactions, therapeutic failures and drug resistance as well as wastes valuable resources. Evidence-based cost-effective treatment recommendations of essential medicines are a way of avoiding these. We assessed primary care prescribers' knowledge about and perceptions of an essential medicines formulary, as well as the reasons for adhering to the recommendations. Methods: We conducted a web based questionnaire survey targeting all physicians working in the primary healthcare of the Stockholm healthcare region (2.3 million inhabitants), regarding the knowledge of, attitudes to and usefulness of the essential medicines formulary of the Stockholm Drug and Therapeutics Committee, the so-called Wise List. Results: Of the 1862 physicians reached by our e-mail invitations, 526 (28%) participated in the survey. All but one respondent knew of the formulary, and 72% used it at least once a week when prescribing. The main reason for using the formulary was evidence-based prescribing; 97% trusted the guidelines, and almost all (98%) found the content easy to understand. At the same time, many prescribers thought that the annual changes of some recommendations were too frequent, and some felt that a national formulary would increase its trustworthiness. Conclusions: We found that the essential medicines formulary was widely used and trusted by the prescribers. The high uptake of the treatment recommendations could be due to the Stockholm Drug and Therapeutics Committee's transparent process for developing recommendations involving respected experts and clinicians using strict criteria for handling potential conflicts of interest, feedback to prescribers, continuous medical education and minor financial incentives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: To explore registered nurses' experience of medication management in municipal care of the elderly in Sweden, with a focus on their pharmacovigilant activities. Design: A qualitative approach using focus-group discussions was chosen in order to provide in-depth information. Data were analysed by qualitative content analysis. Setting: Five focus groups in five different long-term care settings in two regions in Sweden. Subject: A total of 21 registered nurses (RNs), four men and 17 women, aged 27-65 years, with 4-34 years of nursing experience. Results: The findings reveal that RNs in municipal long-term care settings can be regarded as ''vigilant intermediaries'' in the patients' drug treatments. They continuously control the work of staff and physicians and mediate between them, and also compensate for existing shortcomings, both organizational and in the work of health care professionals. RNs depend on other health care professionals to be able to monitor drug treatments and ensure medication safety. They assume expanded responsibilities, sometimes exceeding their formal competence, and try to cover for deficiencies in competence, experience, accessibility, and responsibility-taking. Conclusion: The RNs play a central but also complex role as ''vigilant intermediaries'' in the medication monitoring process, including the issue of responsibility. Improving RNs' possibility to monitor their patients' drug treatments would enable them to prevent adverse drug events in their daily practice. New strategies are justified to facilitate RNs' pharmacovigilant activities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Biological and sociocultural differences between men and women may play an important role in medical treatment. Little is known about the awareness of these differences among general practitioners (GPs) and if they consider such differences in their medical practice. The aim of this study was to explore GPs' perception of sex and gender aspects in medical treatment. Methods: We conducted five focus group discussions (FGDs) with 29 physicians (mainly GPs) in Sweden. A discussion guide with semi-structured questions was used. All FGDs were audio-recorded and transcribed word-by-word. Data were analysed through inductive thematic analysis with no predetermined categories. Results: Three main categories emerged from the data. The first category emphasised GPs' experiences of sex and gender differences in diagnosing and assessment of clinical findings. Medical treatment in men and women was central in the second category. The third category emphasised GPs' knowledge of sex differences in drug therapy. Conclusions: The GPs stated they had little knowledge of sex and gender differences in drug treatment, but gave multiple examples of how the patient's sex affects the choice of treatment. Sex and gender aspects were considered in diagnosing and in the treatment decision. However, once the decision to treat was made the choice of drug followed recommendations by local Drug and Therapeutics Committee, which were perceived to be evidence-based. In the analysis we found a gap between perceived and expressed knowledge of sex and gender differences in drug treatment indicating a need of education about this to be included in the curriculum in medical school and in basic and specialist training for physicians. Education could also be a tool to avoid stereotypical thinking about male and female patients. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Decision-making is central for general practitioners (GP). Practice guidelines are important tools in this process but implementation of them in the complex context of primary care is a challenge. The purpose of this study was to explore how GPs approach, learn from and use practice guidelines in their day-to-day decision-making process in primary care. Method: A qualitative approach using focus-group interviews was chosen in order to provide in-depth information. The participants were 22 GPs with a median of seven years of experience in primary care, representing seven primary healthcare centres in Stockholm, Sweden in 2011. The interviews focused on how the GPs use guidelines in their decision-making, factors that influence their decision how to approach these guidelines, and how they could encourage the learning process in routine practice. Data were analysed by qualitative content analysis. Meaning units were condensed and grouped in categories. After interpreting the content in the categories, themes were created. Results: Three themes were conceptualized. The first theme emphasized to use guidelines by interactive contextualized dialogues. The categories underpinning this theme: 1. Feedback by peer-learning 2. Feedback by collaboration, mutual learning, and equality between specialties, identified important ways to achieve this learning dialogue. Confidence was central in the second theme, learning that establishes confidence to provide high quality care. Three aspects of confidence were identified in the categories of this theme: 1. Confidence by confirmation, 2. Confidence by reliability and 3. Confidence by evaluation of own results. In the third theme, learning by use of relevant evidence in the decision-making process, we identified two categories: 1. Design and lay-out visualizing the evidence 2. Accessibility adapted to the clinical decision-making process as prerequisites for using the practice guidelines. Conclusions: Decision-making in primary care is a dual process that involves use of intuitive and analytic thinking in a balanced way in order to provide high quality care. Key aspects of effective learning in this clinical decision-making process were: contextualized dialogue, which was based on the GPs' own experiences, feedback on own results and easy access to short guidelines perceived as trustworthy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Creating evidence of effectiveness is an important part of service development. In an ongoing research project Swedish community pharmacists participate in services research by recruiting patients initiated on statins to an adherence-promoting cognitive pharmaceutical service, jointly run by nurses and pharmacists., Aims: To explore the pharmacists' experiences of providing part of the service and their views regarding future participation in practice research aiming at developing cognitive pharmaceutical services., Methods: Focus group interviews were conducted with community pharmacists from pharmacies participating in the project. A semi-structured interview guide was developed, based on the aim and earlier research., Results: The domains identified were the service itself, operative conditions, the pharmacists' role/profession and stakeholders. The research project was thought to promote the local pharmacy to customers, increase job satisfaction and contribute to service development. However, a perceived lack of competence among pharmacists affected both patient communication and project involvement. Additional resources and strengthened collaboration with other local healthcare were requested. Competition among pharmacy chains was identified as a barrier to patient-centred service provision and research., Conclusion: The current operative conditions in Swedish community pharmacies were perceived by pharmacists as hampering cognitive pharmaceutical services provision and research. Additional resources, improved communication skills and research competence, and increased collaboration with other healthcare and across pharmacy chains are necessary changes. A stronger patient-centred perspective among all stakeholders is required., (© 2019 Royal Pharmaceutical Society.)

Objectives: To develop and verify proof of concept for a clinical decision support system (CDSS) to support prescriptions of pharmaceutical drugs in patients with reduced renal function, integrated in an electronic health record system (EHR) used in both hospitals and primary care., Methods: A pilot study in one geriatric clinic, one internal medicine admission ward and two outpatient healthcare centers was evaluated with a questionnaire focusing on the usefulness of the CDSS. The usage of the system was followed in a log., Results: The CDSS is considered to increase the attention on patients with impaired renal function, provides a better understanding of dosing and is time saving. The calculated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR) and the dosing recommendation classification were perceived useful while the recommendation texts and background had been used to a lesser extent., Discussion: Few previous systems are used in primary care and cover this number of drugs. The global assessment of the CDSS scored high but some elements were used to a limited extent possibly due to accessibility or that texts were considered difficult to absorb. Choosing a formula for the calculation of eGFR in a CDSS may be problematic., Conclusions: A real-time CDSS to support kidney-related drug prescribing in both hospital and outpatient settings is valuable to the physicians. It has the potential to improve quality of drug prescribing by increasing the attention on patients with renal insufficiency and the knowledge of their drug dosing., (Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.)

Purpose: The aim of the present study was to investigate how prescribers and pharmacists use and perceive the drug-drug interaction database SFINX in their clinical work., Methods: A questionnaire was developed with questions aimed at the usage of SFINX, and the perceptions of the database. The questionnaire was sent out to all registered users of the web application of SFINX. The anonymous answers from the target users, prescribers and pharmacists were summarized using descriptive statistics. Statistical analysis was performed on age and gender differences for some questions regarding different usage patterns., Results: The questionnaire was sent to 11,763 registered SFINX users. The response rate was 23%, including 1871 answers from prescribers or pharmacists. SFINX was reported to be used at least weekly or more often by 45% of the prescribers and 51% of the pharmacists. Many prescribers reported using the database during the patient consultation (60%) or directly before or after (56%). Among the prescribers, 74% reported that the information received made them change their action at least sometimes. About 20% of the prescribers and 25% of the pharmacists considered the information as irrelevant sometimes or more often., Conclusion: Most prescribers and pharmacists reported using SFINX in direct association with a patient consultation. Information received by using SFINX makes prescribers and pharmacists change their handling of patients. DDI databases with relevant information about patient handling might improve drug treatment outcome., (Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.)

Background: Teenagers in Sweden were given greater access as consumers of OTC drugs in 2009 after the reregulation of the pharmacy market, which allowed for the establishment of private pharmacies and sale of specific over-the-counter (OTC) drugs in retail stores and gas stations. Increased access to OTC drugs could provide new opportunities for self-care but attenuates the opportunity for the traditional expert surveillance of pharmacists, thus increasing the possibility of inappropriate OTC drug use., Objectives: Views of 16-19 year old Swedish teenagers on OTC drugs, with special regard to analgesic drugs were explored and described, based on the following questions: How and where did they acquire their knowledge and attitudes regarding OTC drugs? What perceptions did they have about the use of OTC drugs?, Methods: A qualitative approach with a descriptive design was chosen. Data were collected in 2011 with 10 focus group discussions with high school students aged 16-19 years from different parts of Sweden. A total of 77 teenagers participated, 33 males and 44 females. A manifest qualitative content analysis was performed., Results: While most teenagers appeared to have responsible attitudes toward OTC drugs and their use, some teenagers had attitudes that ranged from casual to careless. The focus group discussions also revealed knowledge gaps among teenagers regarding OTC drugs, and the significant influence of parents and peers on their OTC drug use., Conclusions: This study provides insight into how vulnerable some teenagers could be as new consumers of OTC drugs and suggested that educational efforts could be geared toward parents as well as teenagers., (Copyright © 2014 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)