ArticleHealth & social care in the community2022
Enhancing deprescribing: A qualitative understanding of the complexities of pharmacist-led deprescribing in care homes.
Article in Health & social care in the community, 2022. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 10 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
10 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 13 citations in OpenAlex.
- The views of healthcare professionals and family members on deprescribing preventive medication in people living with dementia: a qualitative systematic review.BMC geriatrics · 2026Pooled it
- What Deprescribing Information Should Be Communicated on Discharge and How? A Qualitative Study of Pharmacists' Perspectives on Deprescribing at Transitions of Care.Australasian journal on ageing · 2026Article
- How do pharmacists navigate clinical uncertainty when reviewing polypharmacy? A critical literature review.BMC primary care · 2025Review
- Developing a Theoretically Informed Strategy to Enhance Pharmacist-Led Deprescribing in Care Homes for Older People.Pharmacy (Basel, Switzerland) · 2025Article
- Barriers and Facilitators to Pharmacist-Led Deprescribing of Antihypertensives in Long-Term Care: A Survey-Based Study.Basic & clinical pharmacology & toxicology · 2025Article
- Service delivery and the role of clinical pharmacists in UK primary care for older people, including people with dementia: a scoping review.BMC primary care · 2025Article
- The role of community pharmacists in medicines optimisation for housebound people: A scoping review.PloS one · 2025Article
- The REGENERATE Study: A Non-Randomized Feasibility Study of an Intervention to REduce anticholinerGic burdEN in oldER pATiEnts.Geriatrics (Basel, Switzerland) · 2024Article
- An integrative systematic review of nurses' involvement in medication deprescription in long-term healthcare settings for older people.Therapeutic advances in drug safety · 2024Review
- Enhancing deprescribing: A qualitative understanding of the complexities of pharmacist-led deprescribing in care homes.Health & social care in the community · 2022Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
8 authors at 4 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
The English National Overprescribing Review identified that older people often take eight or more medicines a day. The report recommended pharmacists in primary care should take responsibility for addressing polypharmacy. Overprescribing is a safety concern in care homes as approximately half of older care home residents are prescribed at least one medicine that is unnecessary or now harmful. This predisposes them to adverse outcomes including hospitalisation and mortality. Deprescribing is the planned activity of stopping or reducing a medicine that may no longer be appropriate. Deprescribing, when performed by a pharmacist, is a multidisciplinary activity requiring close communication with general practitioners (GPs) and care home staff. A recently completed trial that integrated pharmacists with prescribing rights into older peoples' care homes found significant variation in proactive deprescribing activity. The aim of the current study was to specifically explore beliefs and practices of deprescribing in care homes. A qualitative approach was adopted to examine individual, social and contextual factors that acted as enablers and barriers to pharmacist deprescribing in care homes. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with participants of the previous study (16 pharmacists, 6 GPs and 7 care home staff from Northern Ireland, Scotland and England). Using thematic analysis, we identified two themes: (a) Structures and systems affecting deprescribing, that is the context in which deprescribing happened, including team involvement and routine practices in GP surgeries and care homes; (b) Balancing risks when deprescribing, that is the perception of individual risk and social barriers were mitigated by understanding the medical background of residents. This supported the clinical understanding that risks from overprescribing were greater than risks from deprescribing. While deprescribing can involve all health professionals in the primary care team, these results suggest the pharmacist is well placed to lead the process; by having both clinical competence and professional willingness to drive this activity forward.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.