Publications presenting negative impacts of pharmacists

Objectives: The main objective was to evaluate the rate of publications with at least one indicator of the negative impact of clinical pharmaceutics activity.

Methods: This is a descriptive and retrospective literature review. A literature search was conducted using Pubmed. Articles published between 2009-2014 that described the role and impacts of pharmacists were included. We calculated the rate of publication containing at least one negative indicator. We collected the indicators with negative results.

Results: A total of 203 articles were included. Nine articles (4%) that had at least one indicator of negative impact were identified. A total of 66% (6/9) were conducted in the United States. The study designs of the articles included were a meta-analysis (n=1), a systematic review (n=1), randomized studies (n=2), pre-post studies (n=3), a cohort study (n=1) and a survey (n=1). Nine indicators of negative impact were identified.

Conclusion: There were nine publications with at least one negative indicator of the impact of clinical pharmacy activity. While there are a large number of studies about the positive impact of clinical pharmacy activities; the publication of negative results should be encouraged.