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A collaborative practice program involving Community Pharmacies and Primary Care for COVID-19 detection

  • At: PPR 2022 (2022)
  • Type: Poster
  • Poster code: PT-06
  • By: MIR, Joan Francesc (Col·legi de Farmacèutics de Barcelona)
  • Co-author(s): Joan Francesc Mir, Consultant Pharmacist And Researcher, Col·legi de Farmacèutics de Barcelona, Spain
    Gloria Blazquez, Public Health Specialist, Servei de Vigilància Epidemiològica del Barcelonès Nord i Maresme, Departament de Salut, Spain
    David Ferrandiz-Mont, Public Health Specialist, Servei de Vigilància Epidemiològica del Vallès, Departament de Salut, Spain
    Guillermo Bagaria, Community Pharmacists' Spokesperson and Member of the Board, Departament de Salut, Spain
    Cristina Rodriguez-Caba, Head of Professional Projects, Training and Research Area, Sector Sanitari Vallès Occidental Oest, Servei Català de la Salut (CatSalut), Spain
    Mercè Rivas, Departament de Salut
    Cati Serra Carbonell, Head of Vallès Occidental Oest Healthcare Sector
    Maria Rosa Sala Farre, Head of the service


  • Abstract:

    BACKGROUND
    Community pharmacists were amongst the few healthcare professionals readily available for face-to-face consultation after the first COVID-19 outbreak in Catalonia, Spain. A collaborative practice program was created in September 2020 to ease the referral to and communication with Primary Care (PC) of those Community Pharmacy (CP) users who had COVID-19-like symptoms. This program, known as JoDIC, was created by the Epidemiological Surveillance Services (ESS) of Vallès and Barcelonès-Nord-Maresme Areas, the Catalan Healthcare Service (CatSalut) and Barcelona Pharmacists Association (COFB). After using a paper-based system at the beginning, a safe cloud-based software hosted in Farmaserveis, the Catalan pharmacy services platform, started running in February 2021, to facilitate patients’ follow-up. In June 2021, referral for COVID-19 vaccination was included to the platform. COVID-19 antigenic tests were not available in Spanish CPs until July 2021.

    PURPOSE
    To enable an effective and safe referral and communication system from CPs to PC centers of patients needing COVID-19-related healthcare interventions, within the JoDIC program; and to describe the pharmaceutical interventions performed in the JoDIC program framework.

    METHOD
    COFB, ESS and CatSalut jointly designed JoDIC circuit, which was activated at the CP to detect users with COVID-19-like symptoms, users who were a close contact to a COVID-19 case or users who were not fully vaccinated. The initial paper-based circuit started in September 2020, involving Vallès area only. Complete referral data was gathered from February 5th 2021 to December 31st 2020 period of study, when Farmaserveis specific module was launched. On June 23rd 2021, JoDIC was expanded to the whole Northern Barcelona Metropolitan Area, comprising more than 2 million inhabitants who are serviced by 649 CP. By filling up a form on Farmaserveis, the patient’s data was referred by a community pharmacist to the PC center to evaluate each case and to provide further care needed.

    RESULTS
    528 community pharmacists working in 372 CP were trained in the protocol. Community pharmacists performed interventions in 1303 CP users (496, paper-based; and 807, registered on Farmaserveis). 111 CP registered pharmaceutical interventions on Farmaserveis (7.4 patients per CP). 63.1% (509) of CP users, received health education by the pharmacist, while 36.9% (298) were referred to their PC center. 71.6% of the referred patients were due to having COVID-19-like symptoms; 25.3%, were close contacts to COVID-19-positive cases; and 3.1%, to be vaccinated. 68.8% of the referred patients eventually attended their appointments with their family physician. 63.4% of the visited patients needed some kind of diagnostic test. 30.8% tests were COVID-19-positive.

    CONCLUSIONS
    The current pandemic favoured the establishment of new COVID-19 detection circuits and communication ways between ESS, CP and PC centers. Our data shows high efficacy to detect COVID-19-positive cases (30.8% positivity) and good acceptability amongst referred citizens (68.8% successful referrals). JoDIC program is a seminal project that will facilitate communication amongst PC and CP professionals in other contexts.

Last update 28 September 2023

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