Economic impact of community pharmacist intervention in cholesterol risk management: An evaluation of the Study of Cardiovascular Risk Intervention by Pharmacists
Sh. Simpson et al., Economic impact of community pharmacist intervention in cholesterol risk management: An evaluation of the Study of Cardiovascular Risk Intervention by Pharmacists, PHARMACOTHE, 21(5), 2001, pp. 627-635
The Study of Cardiovascular Risk Intervention by Pharmacists, a randomized,
controlled trial in over 50 community pharmacies in Alberta and Saskatchew
an, Canada, demonstrated that a pharmacist intervention program improved ch
olesterol risk management in patients at high risk for cardiovascular disea
se. In a substudy, costs and consequences were analyzed to describe the eco
nomic impact of the program. Two perspectives were taken: a government-fund
ed health care system and a pharmacy manager. Costs were reported in 1999 C
anadian dollars. Incremental costs to a government payor and community phar
macy manager were $6.40/patient and $21.76/patient, respectively, during th
e 4-month follow-up period. The community pharmacy manager had an initial i
nvestment of $683.50. The change in Framingham risk function for the interv
ention group from baseline also was reported. The 10-year risk of cardiovas
cular disease decreased from 17.3% to 16.4% (p <0.0001) during the 4 months
. The intervention program in this study led to a significant reduction in
cardiovascular risk in the intervention group during the 4-month follow-up
period. The incremental cost to provide the program appeared minimal from b
oth government and pharmacy manager perspectives. It is hoped that these re
sults could support negotiations for reimbursement of clinical pharmacy ser
vices with payors.