Dr. Tamasine Grimes

Summary

We aim to engage civic society in research by recruiting public and patient involvement (PPI) representatives to our research team to analyse, interpret and exchange knowledge about household medication safety practices for people who are cocooning during COVID-19. We will recruit a PPI panel through our partner charity and deliver data analysis training . PPI representatives will independently analyse and interpret data, co-produce evidence-based recommendations and co-design outreach outputs (e.g. infographics), thereby maximising dissemination to lay and academic audiences. We will optimise future civic society engagement in research by PPI shared learning with peers and academic upskilling in PPI techniques.

Funding Agency

Irish Research Council

Programme

New Foundations 2020

Summary

Funding Agency

Provost PhD Award TCD 2019-20

Project Type

PhD

Person Months

48

Summary

Lead PI (knowledge user) T. Delaney, Tallaght University Hospital Lead PI (academic) T. Grimes, TCD Co-PIs: S. Kennelly (TUH and TCD), S. Cromie (TCD, Centre for Innovative Human Systems), J Cahill (TCD, Centre for Innovative Human Systems), J Pevnick (University of California, San Francisco).

Funding Agency

The Meath Foundation

Project Type

Research fellowship

Person Months

6

Summary

Periods of care transition, e.g., hospital admission or discharge, are vulnerable times for medication safety because they involve an increased risk of miscommunication, medication error and medication changes, and involve a greater burden of patient/carer medication work, compared to other stages of care. Previous studies about transitional medication safety in Ireland have examined process outcomes, e.g., medication error or quality of prescribing, explored health services management in a particular setting, e.g., inpatient care, and delivered by and from the perspective of healthcare professionals. Although such studies help to characterise the problem, they provide limited information from the patient's/carer's perspective to inform improvements in their self-management of their own transitional medication safety, despite this being an international priority. This proposal addresses these gaps using interviews with patients, or their informal carers, who use 10+ medications daily and experienced hospital admission or discharge in the previous six months. It is novel in the Irish context because it adopts a systems-engineering and human factors approach to understand, from the perspective of patients/carers with complex medication needs, the experience of transitional medication self-management and the interactions with other elements in the system. This data will inform system improvements. Relevance to improving healthcare: This research is needed now because evidence identifies an increasing prevalence of polypharmacy and potentially inappropriate medication use across middle-aged and older-aged populations; increasing prevalence of medication related hospital (re)admission and an association between hospitalisation and medication burden. Anecdotal local evidence suggests that patients frequently do not have medication lists (out of hour's presentation to ED) at a time when they are most vulnerable to harm by medication errors including omissions, and that they could be better prepared for and involved in care transitions. Contemporaneously, government health policy calls for improved integration of care and enhanced patient/carer involvement in self-managing their health. This project addresses these needs and priorities.

Funding Agency

The Meath Foundation

Project Type

Post-doctoral research project

Person Months

8

Summary

PI: T Grimes PhD Student: G Kirwan The impact of Collaborative Pharmaceutical Care at Tallaght Hospital (PACT) Implementation on Discharge Medication Error. A Stepped-Wedge, Cluster Randomised Controlled Study.

Funding Agency

Tallaght Hospital

Programme

Investigating the health economics and scale-up of the PACT intervention

Project Type

PhD studentship