Observational studyScience progress
Drug-related problems in elective surgical inpatients: A retrospective study.
Observational study in Science progress. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 3 papers.
What it found
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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.
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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.
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Who cites it
3 citing papers in PubMed.
- Burden and Determinants of Drug-Drug Interactions at Hospital Discharge: Warfarin as a Model for High-Risk Medication Safety.Clinics and practice · 2025Article
- Targeting antimicrobial restriction: outcomes of pharmacist-led stewardship interventions at the university hospital Salzburg.Infection · 2025Observational
- Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
5 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
objectivesPatients with drug-related problems are at high risk for perioperative complications. The study aimed to determine the prevalence, number, characteristics, clinical significance and the involved drugs of drug-related problems in inpatients, who were admitted to elective surgery, as well as their burden of comorbidity.
methodsThe study design was a retrospective, observational study across nine different surgical sites. Patients at admission for elective surgery with ≥ 1 drug-related problem, a hospital stay of ≥ 24 h and at age ≥ 18 years were included. The outcomes of interest were the prevalence and nature of drug-related problems, assessed by pharmacists at hospital admission. The Pharmaceutical Network Europe classification V9.1, the Hatoum scale of clinical significance, the Anatomical-Therapeutic-Chemical classification scheme of the World Health Organization were engaged to categorize drug-related problems and their clinical significance. The Charlson Comorbidity Index was applied to assess the comorbidity of participants.
resultsThe final data set included 11,176 elective surgical inpatients. Of these, a sample of 284 (2.54%) patients was analysed. It was found that 9.89% of the patients showed at least one drug-related problem (average 1.43, SD 0.7). Major causes were drug-drug interactions (30.3%) and supra-therapeutic doses (18.0%). Most drug-related problems were referred to a prescriber for intervention (61.3%). Eighty-two percent of drug-related problems were rated as clinically significant. Cardiovascular drugs were of major concern. Participants' most common comorbidities were tumour diagnosis (34%), diabetes mellitus with end organ damage (26%) and peripheral vascular diseases (19%).
conclusionsAlthough the prevalence of drug-related problems in this diverse study population was low, drug-related problems were of great importance in terms of their cause and clinical significance. Patients with drug-related problems showed a moderate burden of physiological illness. Study results suggest a need to identify exposed patients with drug-related problems.
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