Smoking cessation advice provided in 53 Norwegian pharmacies

Abstract

Objective To investigate the quality of the smoking cessation advice on over‐the‐counter (OTC) nicotine replacement treatment (NRT) provided by community and hospital pharmacies in Norway and to assess any change in customer services and pharmaceutical smoking cessation advice after a change in legislation deregulating NRT from pharmacy‐only to general sale. Method A mystery shopper made 106 visits to 53 pharmacies in Oslo, Norway. The first visit was when NRT was a pharmacy‐only medicine and the second when it had become available from any outlet as a general sales product. The pharmacies were scored on 12 observation parameters regarding customer service and pharmaceutical advice (score 0–4, total possible score was 48). Key findings There was considerable inter‐ and intra‐pharmacy variation in scores. The pharmacies' total score ranged from 3 to 45. On only 14.2% of the visits was the service categorised as ‘Good’. There was no statistically significant difference in total score between the two test periods (P = 0.56), and hence no measurable difference in customer services and pharmaceutical advice as a result of increased competition after the switch to general sale. A scatter plot showed no relationship between the individual pharmacies' total score at the two visits. Conclusions Pharmacies' scores for the quality of their smoking cessation advice were generally low. There was no measurable change in pharmacies' customer service and pharmaceutical advice following the deregulation of NRT. There was little consistency in the total score between the first and the second visit to the same pharmacy. Improvement is needed in the smoking cessation advice provided by Norwegian pharmacies.

A systematic review of the use of simulated patients and pharmacy practice research

“…Additional references were identified from the reference lists of retrieved studies and from the authors' own reference collections. In total, 56 full publications were retrieved for further examination of which, 46 studies were included in the review (Tables 1 and 2), including: nine RCTs, [7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15] three controlled trials, [16][17][18] 30 cross-sectional, two time-series 49,50 and two 'other' studies. 13,51 Ten publications were excluded: seven reviews, 52-58 one laboratory-based study, 59 one telephone survey 60 and one study presented only as an abstract.…”

“…Thirteen studies were undertaken in Europe, 14,15,17,20,21,24,27,30,37,40,43,49,50 nine in Asia, 7,12,13,22,29,39,42,47,51 eight in South and Central America, 8,9,18,25,31,35,45,48 seven in North America, 23,26,32,34,36,41,46 four in Africa, 13,16,28,33 three in Australasia 10,11,38 and one in the Middle East. 19 The remaining study was conducted across three countries.…”

“…17 Thornley et al used data from a company which regularly carried out simulated patient visits, 43 and Granas et al used a simulated patient with previous training and experience in participant observation, including in a pharmacy setting. 49 Seven studies involved a substantial formal training course for simulated patients. However, again, few details were provided about these.…”

“…The member of staff involved in the visits was not always identifiable as a pharmacist or another member of staff. 15,38,49 The completeness of reporting of study methodology was highly variable, and was particularly problematic where specific types of information were omitted, e.g. visit completion rate, training methods, derivation of outcome measures.…”

How do pharmacists respond to complaints of acute insomnia? A simulated patient study

“…This method has been employed extensively in Australian [21,22], and international pharmacy practice based research [23][24][25][26][27][28][29]. Ethical approval for this study was granted by the Human Research and Ethics Council (HREC) of the University of Sydney in July of 2009.…”