Joint medication reviews shown to improve outcomes and reduce hospital admissions 

A recent evaluation, funded by HIEM, of a pilot service in Leicester, Leicestershire and Rutland ICB has shown the benefits of their polypharmacy multidisciplinary review pilot service.

 Evidence from the first eight MDT clinics across LLR indicates success in the pilot.

The data shows that:

• 5% of the patients participating in the pilot had an anticholinergic cognitive burden (ACB) reduction of between 1 and 7 points.
• 63 recommendations were made, resulting in one ‘possible’ and 9 ‘likely’ admissions avoidance.
• 28% of patients (10) had a reduction of 3 or more medicines.
• Eclipse scores, recorded before and after the MDT polypharmacy review, had a 25% reduction (but could be due to other interventions in addition to the MDT).
• Staff and patient feedback gained in the evaluation was also positive.

The pilot aimed to reduce overprescribing and inappropriate polypharmacy across LLR through a specialist polypharmacy MDT. This pilot uses risk stratification to help identify complex patients to refer to an MDT clinic.

Health economic analysis indicated that, where assumptions are made on admissions avoidance, across the 2,612 patients eligible for LLR, this could result in £656,192 of total benefits and a benefit-cost ratio of 1.25.

Read the full evaluation report.

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