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Abstract

Background and Objective: The cooperation in a multi-professional team with physicians, nurses and clinical pharmacists is important for a safer and more cost-effective use of medications. Therefore, increased understanding of how other healthcare professionals relate to clinical pharmacy services, and agreement on how the collaboration should be designed, is essential.

The aim of this study was to evaluate the opinions of physicians and nurses toward collaboration with clinical pharmacists.

Design: An electronic survey was conducted during February and March 2023. A web-based survey tool, Webropol, was used to create and distribute the survey, and collect responses. The survey was sent to 163 participants, of whom 80 were physicians and 83 were nurses.

Setting: Physicians and nurses employed at the health centers in Katrineholm, Flen, Vingåker and Malmköping, as well as the "Heart and Medicine Department" and the "Stroke and Medicine Department" at Kullbergska Hospital in Katrineholm.

Main outcome measures: How physicians and nurses experience the collaboration with clinical pharmacists in the western part of the Sörmland region.

Results: A total of 44 respondents answered the survey, of whom 22 were physicians and 22 were nurses. The majority (87.9%) of respondents experience the collaboration with clinical pharmacists as positive. Of the physicians, 76.2% experience the collaboration as positive. The corresponding number for nurses is 91.7%. The majority of physicians and nurses agree that pharmaceutical services contribute to increased patient safety and increased level of knowledge about medications.

Conclusions: The majority of physicians and nurses experience the collaboration with clinical pharmacists as positive, and that it contributes to increased patient safety and increased level of knowledge about medications. Knowledge of the possibility of being able to contact clinical pharmacists, and knowledge of what clinical pharmacists can help with are factors that can contribute to the further implementation of the pharmacist's role in healthcare centers and wards, and thus to increased collaboration.