Purpose: The role of specialized pharmacy services remains unexplored in clinical practice for hepatitis C patients in Pakistan. This study aimed to evaluate the impact of clinical pharmacy interventions on treatment outcomes, health-related quality of life (HRQoL), and medication adherence among hepatitis C patients. Methods: A randomized control trial was conducted at two tertiary-care teaching hospitals in Pakistan. Hepatitis C patients who attended the outpatient clinics between October 2015 and September 2018 were randomized to two groups [usual care (UC) and pharmaceutical care (PC)] in a 1:1 ratio, applying simple envelope method. The PC group received pharmaceutical care led by a clinical pharmacist. The care that patients received included education and counseling on medication compliance, labeling of medication packs, and monitoring of adverse drug events, led by a qualified clinical pharmacist during the 15-to 20-minute monthly sessions, while the UC group received standard care at hospital, which did not involve clinical pharmacist input. Outcome measures, such as sustained virological response, HRQoL, and adherence rate (pharmacy data) were assessed at enrolment and distinct time intervals: 4 weeks, 8 weeks, and end of treatment. Results: A total of 931 patients were included in the study (UC 466 and PC 465), with mean age 42.35±1.9 years. Sustained virological response at 12 weeks was achieved in 86.0% patients in the PC group, significantly (p<0.001) higher than the UC (69.3%) group. Fewer patients (9.9%) in the PC group reported mobility problems, significantly fewer (p<0.001) than the UC group (11.8%). Self-care, usual activity, pain, and depression were relieved significantly in the PC group compared to the UC group. The EuroQol visual analogue scale (baseline 56.1 of UC group versus 55.2 for PC group) was raised to 71.8 and 71.9 in the UC and PC groups, respectively. Medication adherence was significantly improved (p<0.001) in the PC group (88.6%) when compared to the UC group (77.9%, 95% CI 88.9%-91.9%). Conclusion: Pharmacist-led clinical pharmacy interventions as part of multidisciplinary care had a significant impact on improving cure rates, HRQoL, and medication adherence for hepatitis C patients. This study suggests that clinical pharmacists should be incorporated into the multidisciplinary health-care team for care of hepatitis C patients.
Madagascar is a high trade cost and relatively closed economy. The WTO's latest Trade Policy Review (TPR) for the country, like all TPRs, concentrates on border sources of trade costs, those induced by trade policy instruments such as tariffs or implicit taxes imposed by slow and costly customs procedures or trade documentation requirements. This narrow focus for trade policy and facilitation misses the substantive within‐and‐beyond‐the‐border sources of trade costs experienced by traders in a country like Madagascar. This paper illustrates the nature and significance of a narrow and broad view of trade costs and trade facilitation for this relatively remote and ‘internally land‐locked’ economy.
This article examines the effects of domestic currency depreciation on agricultural exports from Pakistan including the responses of price and quantity margins. It uses highly disaggregated firm‐level data that contains the exchange rates of the actual currencies of invoicing at the transaction level. The study finds that the currency depreciation positively affects both intensive and extensive margins. The intensive margin increase in agricultural exports operates mainly through prices, whereas the response of quantities is relatively smaller. Moreover, depreciation improves the extensive margins of firms and products and expands the client base in existing markets. These responses vary widely across firms' exporting experience, trade orientation, sectoral and spatial distribution, exchange rate regimes, and invoicing currencies.
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