Reduction of Low-value Prescribing Through Audit and Feedback
For patients and families
In plain language
An automatic summary of structured registry data. It is an orientation aid, not a substitute for the official protocol or a physician assessment.
- What is being studied
- The protocol lists: Usual AF, Facilitated AF.
- Who it may be relevant to
- Registry conditions: Inappropriate Prescribing, Implementation Science, Behavioral Sciences. Basic parameters: from 65 years · All.
- What needs checking
- Age, condition and sex are only basic indicators. Prior treatment, laboratory values and other mandatory requirements appear in the eligibility criteria below.
- Where it takes place
- Spain
- Next step
- Save the trial, show it to the treating physician, and confirm current recruitment with the study center. Costs, documents and travel →
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Official title
AFFAP Trial: The Comparative Evaluation of Audit and Feedback-based De-implementation Strategies to Reduce Low-value Prescribing in Primary Care in Patients Over 65 Years of Age.
Overview
The objective is to estimate the effect attributable to a primary care pharmacist-led audit and feedback (AF) strategy compared to the currently used AF strategy as a management tool to evaluate healthcare performance focusing on processes and outcomes, for reducing the rate of patients over 65 years of age with potentially inappropriate prescribing (PIP) of benzodiazepines, proton pump inhibitors and opioids. A closed-cohort stepped-wedge cluster-randomised trial will be conducted in nine PC centres from Barakaldo-Sestao Integrated Health Organization, Basque Health Service (Osakidetza). All health centre clusters will start under the control condition, and after an initial study period of 4 months in the control phase, one centre per step at 1-month intervals will be randomly assigned to crossover to the intervention, under which they will be exposed to an additional component of AF, namely, primary care pharmacist-led facilitation. Mixed-methods analysis will be performed, gathering quantitative data to assess the results of the implementations at health centre and clinician levels, and qualitative data to assess the feasibility and perceived impact of the de-implementation strategies from the clinicians' perspective, and explore the experience and satisfaction of patients regarding the healthcare received. This study will provide useful knowledge on the effect attributable to a more intensive AF strategy (facilitated AF) compared to standard procedures of AF reports, and of the characteristics of AF that are most effective.
Interventions
- Behavioral Usual AF
The strategy currently used as a management tool to evaluate healthcare performance focusing on processes and outcomes, as part of Osakidetza's operating contract: provision of AF, sent to PC centres every 4 months with data on overall rates of PIP, lists of patients over 65 years old who have a potentially inappropriate prescription of at least one of the drugs of interest, and provision of support materials related to appropriate prescribing and recommendations on deprescribing. - Behavioral Facilitated AF
Based on a facilitation component delivered by PC pharmacy staff. Specifically, the PC pharmacists will conduct a facilitation session with the centre's clinicians in which they will review the magnitude of PIP in the centre (PIP rates), appropriateness/inappropriateness criteria, and guidelines to encourage deprescribing, and draw up an action plan at clinician and centre levels.
Primary outcome measures
- Primary effectiveness: Proportion of patients with deprescribing or tapering of any of the PIP [Time frame: From baseline to 13 months]
Secondary outcome measures (5)
- Secondary effectiveness: Proportion of patients with deprescribing or tapering for each PIP [Time frame: From baseline to 13 months]
- Secondary Effectiveness: Rate of new PIP [Time frame: From baseline to 13 months]
- Adoption: Percentage of General Practitioners who agree to receive the active components of the strategies [Time frame: From baseline to 13 months]
- Degree of implementation fidelity [Time frame: From baseline to 13 months]
- General Practitioners´ perception of the feasibility and acceptability [Time frame: From baseline to 19 months]
Eligibility criteria
PRIMARY CARE CENTERS IN THE BARAKALDO-SESTAO INTEGRATED HEALTHCARE ORGANISATION OF OSAKIDETZA-BASQUE HEALTH SERVICE:
Inclusion criteria
- collaboration is achieved from at least 51% of the General Practitioners (GP) or at least 4 GPs
- At least 60 patients aged 65 years or older on at least one of the drugs of interest that may be potentially inappropriately prescribed
Exclusion criteria
- N/A
PATIENTS ASSIGNED TO THE PARTICIPATING PC CENTERS:
Inclusion criteria
- Patients over 65 years of age with any of the following unsuitability criteria:
- PIP of benzodiazepines: patients on benzodiazepines for more than 3 months
- PIP of proton pump inhibitors: patients on proton pump inhibitors for more than 8 weeks without a diagnosed gastrointestinal disease and with no long-term prescription of gastrotoxic drugs.
- PIP of opioids: patients on opioids for non-cancer pain for more than 3 months.
Exclusion criteria
- Patients who, in the opinion of the general practitioner, are not suitable candidates for tapering or discontinuation of the potentially inappropriately prescribed drug
- Patients residing in care homes
- Patients receiving palliative care
Criteria are shown verbatim from the registry (in English). Final eligibility is always assessed by the study center.
Healthy volunteers: Yes
Study design
- Allocation
- Randomized
- Model
- Crossover
- Masking
- Double blind
- Primary purpose
- Health services research
Study locations
Spain · 1 center
- Primary Care Research Unit of Bizkaia — Barakaldo
Identifiers
NCT: NCT07336550 · 2024111054 · 2018111085 · 2021111024 · PI21/00025 · RD24/0005/0017 · RD21/0016/0003 · RD16/0007/0002