A meta-analysis of studies that investigated measures designed to improve health professionals’ interactions with patients confirms that these can produce health benefits equivalent to taking a daily Asprin to prevent a hearth attack, reports [s]HealthCanal[/s]. While it has long been believed that a good patient-clinician relationship can improve health outcomes, objective evidence to support that belief has been hard to come by. ‘Although the effect was small, this is the first analysis … to show that relationship factors really do make a difference in patients’ health outcomes,’ says Dr Helen Riess, director of the Empathy and Relational Science Programme at the [b]Massachusetts General Hospital[/b], and senior author of the report in [s]PLOS ONE[/s].
Having a pharmacist call patients at home to go over their medications can identify many medication-based problems. However, [s]Medical Xpress[/s] reports that a new study in [s]Health Services Research[/s] found that pharmacist-patient telephone consultations only appear to reduce hospitalisations in patients who are least at risk. ‘It is a little counterintuitive that those who were healthiest benefited most and those who were the sickest didn’t,’ said lead author Dr Alan Zillich of the [b]Purdue College of Pharmacy[/b], in Indianapolis.
[link url=http://www.healthcanal.com/public-health-safety/49716-study-confirms-impact-of-clinician-patient-relationship-on-health-outcomes.html]Full HealthCanal report[/link]
[link url=http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0094207]PLOS ONE abstract[/link]
[link url=http://medicalxpress.com/news/2014-04-pharmacist-hospital-admissions.html]Full Medical Xpress report[/link]
[link url=http://academyhealth.org/files/2013/sunday/zillich.pdf]Purdue full study[/link]