Medication Therapy Management [Face-to-face vs. Phone Call]

[veyep]

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Hello Gang

I am trying to work with different companies to start a MTM program at my current location, however they are not willing to work with us due to the fact that we won't do face to face interviews, but rather want to do phone interviews. Does anybody have any studies that shows one is not superior over other? I'm putting a document together with different studies, but would love to have more!

Thanks in advance

 

[spacecowgirl]

I don't have a study to say one is superior, but as an MTM pharmacist, I VASTLY prefer face-to-face visits over phone. I like to spread all their med bottles out and look at them, look at the dates on them, how many are there, if they're mixed together, if they're expired, etc, etc, etc. There is so much you cannot do over the phone, IMO.

 

[PumpkinSmasher]

I don't have a study to say one is superior, but as an MTM pharmacist, I VASTLY prefer face-to-face visits over phone. I like to spread all their med bottles out and look at them, look at the dates on them, how many are there, if they're mixed together, if they're expired, etc, etc, etc. There is so much you cannot do over the phone, IMO.

Especially if you are talking about diabetic patients and you want to teach administration of insulin and use of glucometer. Or assess inhaler technique for patients. Although phone based has its limitations, there is a lot of good interventions that can be made during these phone based patient consults.

 

[EBPharm]

Hi there,

I recently conducted a literature search for a topic not specific to phone-based MTM programs but related. I glanced at my search results and found these two that the OP may be interested in. Good luck with your searching. You may want to check out clinicaltrials.gov to see if there are any ongoing or completed studies of phone-based programs/interventions.

 

[veyep]

Hi there,

I recently conducted a literature search for a topic not specific to phone-based MTM programs but related. I glanced at my search results and found these two that the OP may be interested in. Good luck with your searching. You may want to check out clinicaltrials.gov to see if there are any ongoing or completed studies of phone-based programs/interventions.

thank you so much i will look at your provided data right now! I have exhausted all my search options, i've tried from google, clinicaltrials.gov, pubmed, ashp, apha and 10 more sources but it is a very specific data that i am looking for hence making it very hard to find good results.

Again appreciate everybody's response!

 

[EBPharm]

thank you so much i will look at your provided data right now! I have exhausted all my search options, i've tried from google, clinicaltrials.gov, pubmed, ashp, apha and 10 more sources but it is a very specific data that i am looking for hence making it very hard to find good results.

Again appreciate everybody's response!

From what I can see comparative effectiveness data for that specific question (phone vs. in-person programs) is pretty limited right now. It seems that is an area of uncertainty. You might want to check AHRQ's Effective Health Care Program and Evidence-based Practice Program. They completed an MTM project in 2007 and have some ongoing work including a report titled "Enabling MTM through Health IT", which may discuss some of the newer technologies of MTM implementation. Here is a link to the protocol: http://www.ahrq.gov/clinic/tp/medmgttp.htm

Also, I know that in 2010 CMS has revised their reporting requirements for MTM funded programs to include more outcomes data. They may be collecting outcomes data for various program types. You could check in with someone at CMS for any potential unpublished Part D data they have.

It seems like you have looked at most of the major sources. You may also try the HSRproj database here: http://wwwcf.nlm.nih.gov/hsr_project/home_proj.cfm

CE research for this question is needed. Maybe your organization should apply for a grant to set up an study to determine which method has better patient outcomes 😉