Pharmacy Continence Care - Bladder and Bowel Website

Consumer recruitment was part of the evaluation strategy, designed to enable assessment of
the benefits to consumers of the pharmacy’s participation in this project. To provide an
adequate sample size to assess consumer attitudes to and benefits from the Program, each
pharmacy was asked to aim to recruit 10 or more customers to complete the questionnaire.
The training materials to pharmacies included a template for a customer feedback
questionnaire. Each pharmacy was provided with a substantial resource kit containing
information for consumers, including specific information for particular age groups and
conditions. Pharmacies were advised and encouraged to use display materials provided to
profile their interest in and willingness to provide advice on continence care to their
customers.
Element 4 – Outcomes and Effectiveness Analysis
An evaluation framework was developed to measure costs and benefits of the pilot project to
pharmacies and benefits for consumers. The participating pharmacists were asked to recruit
10 consumers each to participate in the evaluation of the Program.
The evaluation of the pilot Program was designed to comprise:
• a baseline survey of the pharmacies, undertaken through a questionnaire administered
by a NOVA consultant
• a baseline survey of 500 consumers, to be recruited within and by the pharmacies over
the period of the pilot project (April to June 2005). Each consumer consenting to be part
of the pilot project was to be provided with a printed questionnaire, together with a
printed reply-paid envelope, by the staff member of the pharmacy who engaged the
consumer in discussion about incontinence
• a follow-up survey of the 50 pharmacies at the conclusion of the pilot, through readministration
of the baseline questionnaire by a NOVA consultant
• a follow-up telephone survey of 300 consumers randomly selected from the 500 who
agreed to participate in the trial, using the baseline questionnaire with additional agreed
items.
The review of literature and evaluation reports relevant to continence service provision,
including the National Continence Management Strategy Outcomes Measurement Suite,
indicated that outcomes and effectiveness were most likely to be indicated by:
• improved pharmacy knowledge and consumer-directed activity relating to continence
• measurable changes in pharmacy business activity
• better identification and onward referral of untreated/poorly managed incontinence
• better ongoing support and monitoring of people with incontinence and/or their carers
• improved consumer health (self-report) and quality of life
• improved self-reported carer health and wellbeing
• improved self-reported carer management of the incontinence needs of the person
requiring care.
In addition, consumer benefits might include change in individual costs for incontinence care
(such as purchases of disposables – pads, catheters, drip collectors – and costs of
pharmaceuticals). The increases or decreases in costs ought to be correlated with the way
the person with or at risk of incontinence perceives the outcome in terms of increase,
decrease or no change in incontinence management or ability to maintain continence.
Final Report
8
NOVA Public Policy
Pharmacy Continence Care Project