Pharmacy Student Facilitation of Reporting of Adverse Drug Reactions in a Hospital.

BACKGROUND: Health Canada relies on health professionals to voluntarily report adverse reactions to the Canada Vigilance Program. Current rates of reporting adverse drug reactions (ADRs) are inadequate to detect important safety issues.

OBJECTIVE: To assess the impact of pharmacy student facilitation of ADR reporting by pharmacists at a tertiary care teaching hospital in Canada.

METHODS: The intervention of interest, implemented at one campus of the hospital, was facilitation of ADR reporting by pharmacy students. The students received training on how to submit ADR reports and presented information sessions on the topic to hospital pharmacists; the pharmacists were then encouraged to report ADRs to a designated student for formal reporting. Frequency of reporting by pharmacists at the intervention campus was compared with reporting at a control campus of the same hospital. Data were collected prospectively over a 6-month pilot period, starting in April 2015.

RESULTS: During the pilot period, 27 ADR reports were submitted at the intervention campus, and 3 reports at the control campus. All student participants strongly agreed that they would recommend that responsibility for submitting ADR reports to the Canada Vigilance Program remain with pharmacy students during future rotations.

CONCLUSIONS: Availability of a pharmacy student to facilitate reporting of ADRs may increase the frequency of ADR reporting and could alleviate pharmacist workload; this activity is also a potentially valuable learning experience for students.