The Impact of Pharmaceutical Services in Community and Ambulatory Care Settings: Evidence and Recommendations for Future Research

OBJECTIVE:TO review and evaluate research on pharmaceutical services in community and ambulatory care pharmacy settings, specifically study designs and patient outcome measures, and to provide recommendations to improve future research on pharmaceutical services in community and ambulatory care pharmacy settings.DATA SOURCE:English-language articles were identified by searching MEDLINE (1966-December 1998) and International Pharmaceutical Abstracts (1970-December 1998), using a combination of search terms: pharmacist services, pharmacist interventions, community pharmacy, ambulatory care, primary care, and patient outcomes. Relevant studies were selected based on article abstracts.DATA EXTRACTION:From each relevant study, we extracted the study objectives, sample size, study period, study design, major tasks performed by pharmacists, and economic, clinical, and humanistic outcomes (ECHO). Results were tabulated separately for research on community pharmacy and ambulatory care pharmacy settings.RESULTS:We ...