Nurses' responses to patients' medication self-management problems in hospital and the use of recommendations.

ABSTRACT

This study aimed to describe the use of recommendations as a guide for healthcare providers to support patients experiencing medication self-management problems and to evaluate their feasibility, user-friendliness and usefulness. Between March and August 2023, 58 hospitalized patients completed a self-assessment on medication self-management problems. The problems addressed in this self-assessment were based on a list of frequently encountered medication self-management problems from previous research. Consequently, 18 nurses responded to the reported problems using the recommendations. Nurses evaluated the feasibility, user-friendliness and usefulness of these recommendations through a survey. A total of 217 medication self-management problems were reported by 58 patients. Nurses intervened in 52% of the problems using the recommendations. According to nurses, the recommendations were user-friendly and feasible but required a substantial time investment. Considering these pilot-based results, the recommendations have the potential to be a valuable resource for nurses in practice, though this potential requires further exploration.