Community Pharmacist Services for Hypertensive Patients: A Novel Practice in Shanghai, China

Abstract

For Chinese community pharmacists, there is a lack of guidance before and after the drug treatment process for community residents. This study aimed to investigate community pharmacists' role in hypertension management. One hundred ninety-six hypertensive patients were randomly selected from the studied community. For patients in the intervention group, monthly meetings were scheduled with a community pharmacist. Patients in the non-intervention group received standard care from their physicians. In the intervention group, the percentage using information from pharmacists increased significantly, from 54.3% to 94.2% (P < .05). Awareness of self-management was also enhanced, with community self-management group attendance increasing from 53.4% to 77.7% (P < .05), but the non-intervention group did not change significantly. Hypertensive patients' beliefs about community pharmacists also improved significantly. Hypertension status also showed a significant improvement, whereas for participants without intervention, it worsened over time. In addition to increasing knowledge regarding drug use, care provided by community pharmacists can also significantly improve blood pressure status. For those who did not receive intervention, a disproportionate level of health deterioration could be seen.

Keywords: community pharmacist; hypertension; role recognition.

Figure 1.

Hypertension and antihypertensive knowledge source. Note. In the first visit, there is a significant difference between 2 groups in high blood pressure patients obtaining hypertension and antihypertensive knowledge source through newspapers; in the second visit, 2 groups who received knowledge through pharmacists have a significant difference. The rest of the knowledge acquisitions have no significant difference in 2 groups.

Figure 2.

Changes in hypertension status in the intervention and non-intervention groups (n₁ = 103, n₂ = 93).