Implementing Clinical Evidences into Community Pharmacies: Results of the COMPASS and COMPASS-BP Studies

Abstract

Evidence-based medicine (EBM) has led to the development of evidence-based guidelines. The quality of guidelines has been improved by measuring their quality with The Appraisal of Guidelines for Research and Evaluation II (AGREE II) and Grading of Recommendations, Assessment, Development and Evaluation (GRADE). However, evidenced by guidelines not implemented in clinical practice or society, the evidence-practice gap has become apparent. The dissemination and implementation research, which studies methods to solve this problem, has attracted the attention of both clinicians and clinical researchers in recent years. In hypertension and diabetes, it is possible to prevent complications by maintaining good blood pressure and blood glucose levels. However, it is difficult for patients to maintain good laboratory values over the long term, and there has been no solution to this problem. Recently, it has been reported that pharmacists in the U.S. and Canada can improve patient outcomes over the long term by using pharmacies to treat these diseases. This review describes the results of the COMPASS study (diabetes) and the COMPASS-BP study (hypertension), which are the first cluster randomized controlled trials conducted in pharmacies in Japan. In addition, it discusses the possibility of implementation in pharmacies in Japan.