Economic impact of community pharmacist intervention in cholesterol risk management: An evaluation of the Study of Cardiovascular Risk Intervention by Pharmacists

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.