Abstract
Digital tools and data play a key role in achieving more effective and safe prescribing and pharmacotherapy. But when comparing the situation across many different countries, there is still considerably room for improvement when it comes to large-scale implementation of digitally supported care processes or even to the systematic exchange of experience. Promising examples of the integration of digital tools and data into prescribing and pharmacotherapy include National Polypharmacy in Scotland, the EU project iSIMPATHY, as well as work currently being done by various statutory health insurances in Germany. As these examples are often the exception rather than the rule, there is a growing need to address widespread issues of medication therapy safety and badly managed polypharmacy and in particular to prioritise the needs of people with multiple long-term conditions who tend to affected most.
This workshop will bring together stakeholders from across the world working at the interface of medication therapy and digitalisation to discuss the topic from an integrated care perspective. The targeted audience includes health professionals from primary and secondary care, pharmacists, data analysts, IT solution providers, healthcare planners, representatives from medication authorities on all governance levels and also (implementation) researchers.
This 90 minute session starts with a tour-de-table (10’) of everybody present naming their prime concern on the topic in one or two sentences. These concerns will be noted on a shared JamBoard. Next are three short presentations (20’ total) on Digital medicines initiatives from Scotland, Germany and Spain/Belgium, focussing on key drivers and barriers, with a short round for questions (max 10’). The group then breaks into working group tables to discuss topics addressing key concerns that emerge from the initial tour-de-table and the short presentations. Working groups will have 30’ to outline their concern and describe strategies or hands-on measures to address it, coming either from own experience or secondary sources. Outcomes of the break out groups are presented and discussed in the workshop plenum (15’). Finally, the group decides on a future course of action (5’) to be pursued by the three SIGs organizing the workshop.
We will engage with the workshop audience primarily through the highly interactive workshop formats outlined above. Furthermore, we invited oral presentations on “Digital medicines” initiatives from among our network to offer one or two conference sessions on the topic that workshop participants will be invited to attend.
The take home messages and action plan will be jointly published by the SIGs ‘Polypharmacy& Multimorbidity’, ‘Digital Health and Data’ and 'Excellent Integrated Care in a Complex World’ on the IFIC website and serve as a work plan for joint activities until ICIC25.