Impact of pharmacist-led interventions on heart failure medication adherence: a prospective cohort study

Clinical pharmacists play an important role in the optimization and individualization of treatment for heart failure patients in the multidisciplinary team. This study aims to demonstrate the impact of pharmacists’ interventions on medication adherence and adverse outcomes among heart failure patients. This is a prospective cohort study on 95 chronic heart failure patients in a national hospital of Vietnam. Participants in the intervention group received two consultations with a pharmacist on the third day of admission and one week after discharge while patients in the control group received standard care. The Vietnamese version of the Morisky Medication Adherence Scale-8 was applied to measure the medication adherence at the start of the study, at 2 months and 4 months post-discharge. Adverse outcomes including death and hospital readmissions were also collected during the follow-up period. Baseline adherence was 53.3% for the intervention group and 58.3% for the control group. After 2 months, 97.7% of the patients in the intervention group were adherent compared to 80.4% in the control group (P < 0.01). The adherent rates in these groups were 90.2% and 71.1% after 4 months, respectively. The intervention group had fewer combined adverse outcomes than their control counterpart, although the difference was not significant (24.4% versus 35.4%, P = 0.249). Pharmacist-led interventions improved self-reported medication adherence and might have a positive impact on outcomes among heart failure patients. Patient education and consultations should be a standard of practice to optimize treatment plans among heart failure patients.