Research Day 2025

Poster 35) Johnson Osei, Gianna V Marino, Andrew Donnelly, Jennifer Halsey, Taylor L Watterson

Amidst increasing prevalence of fatigue and burnout among community pharmacists and technicians, there is a need to identify comprehensive, yet non-invasive measures of pharmacy work beyond subjective surveys or arbitrary performance quotas. This study aims to 1) evaluate the feasibility of accessing and manipulating audit log data from community pharmacy Electronic Health Records (EHR) and dispensing platforms, and 2) leverage the audit log data to categorize and describe community pharmacist and technician EHR activities and workload. Audit logs, also called “event logs” timestamp user activity within the EHR. They have previously been used to examine clinician work and burnout. Data collection is currently underway. We will retrospectively extract audit logs from an ambulatory pharmacy EHR platiorm for pharmacists and technicians over a one year look back period (Jan 1 2024 to Dec 31 2024). A codebook will be used to describe the structure of the audit logs and classify activities into type of tasks, such as: direct and indirect patient care tasks, administrative tasks, medication-related tasks, documentation, professional communication etc. Descriptive statistics will be used to describe and examine the audit log activities and types. Our anticipated results will show the proportion of a pharmacist’s and technician’s workday spent within the EHR. It will also show the time spent in EHR for each task type—for example amount of time per day performing administrative tasks as opposed to direct patient care tasks. Our preliminary work aims to demonstrate the feasibility of using audit log data from EHR to describe pharmacy work flow. Future research includes validating the audit log data (via the Work Observation Method Activity by Timing tool – WOMBAT) and eventually correlating audit log metrics to occupational fatigue and other well-being measures in pharmacists and pharmacy technicians.

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Poster 61) Grace Fick, Tara Hensle, Henri R Manasse, Jr., Victoria Kulbokas, Sodam Kim, Johnson Osei, Taylor L Watterson

Pharmacists and pharmacy services are cri􀆟cal elements of public health, yet access to these services have historically been shaped by systemic inequi􀆟es and market forces. This study aimed to examine how community pharmacy access in Chicago evolved between 1950 and 2000, with a particular focus on the influence of structural racism, urban renewal, and healthcare financing policies. A quasi-experimental archival observational design was employed using historical data from telephone directories (Chicago Yellow Pages and Polk City Directories) for the years 1950, 1955, 1960, 1983, 1991, 1996, and 2000. Pharmacy names and addressed were transcribed, verified, and categorized as independent, small chain (≤ 4 locations), or retail chain (>4 locations). The data was cleaned for duplicates, geocoded, and visualized in ArcGIS to assess spatial distribution and density trends over the time period. Findings demonstrated a marked decline in independent pharmacies, which decreased from 1,388 in 1950 to only 242 in 2000, representing an 83% reduction. In contrast, retail chain pharmacies expanded from 154 in 1950 to 190 in 2000, reflecting the consolidation of pharmacy services under corporate ownership. Small chains nearly disappeared with major shifts also in U.S. healthcare financing; this includes the introduction of Medicare and Medicaid, and the rise of pharmacy benefit managers. This also appeared alongside urban renewal projects and the effects of redlining and disinvestment, which disproportionately impacted Chicago’s West and South Side neighborhoods. This historical analysis highlights how structural racism, and economic policy collectively contributed to the emergence of ‘pharmacy deserts’ in Chicago. These patterns underscore the importance of policy interventions that support independent and community-based pharmacies, particularly in underserved areas, that can help ensure equitable pharmacy access for all Chicago communities.

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Poster 60) Caroline Wojcik, Taylor L. Watterson

The purpose of this quality improvement project was to identify challenges and propose evidence-based solutions to optimize and expand the Same Day Surgery “Meds to Beds” (MTB) Prescrip􀆟on Discharge Service offered by UI Health Ambulatory Pharmacy Services, at the Specialty Care Building (SCB) outpatient pharmacy. A current state assessment was performed to identify MTB facilitators and barriers. Data for the assessment was obtained via interviews with pharmacy management and review of program operations, prescription volume, and pharmacy workflows. Literature on implementation science and prescription discharge services at other health systems were referenced to shape proposed interventions tailored to SCB. Findings demonstrate that on average, out of 60 surgical cases per day, fewer than 6 patients request the MTB service. The majority of prescriptions filled through this service are class II-controlled substances (32.8%) and over the counter medications (30.2%), which creates barriers to introducing bedside delivery. Other key barriers identified were operational inefficiencies, staff availability, and medication related barriers. Program facilitators included institutional support, such as efforts to onboard staff and hospital leadership investment, proactive communication between the pharmacy and nursing staff, and technological efficiencies that flag and alert the pharmacy of MTB-specific orders. Drawing from other institutions and adapted to UI Health from implementation science literature, the following solutions were proposed: integration of EHR tracking boards to streamline interprofessional communication and bedside delivery, pre-operative outreach to prepare patients and anticipate patient volume and remote pharmacist consultations to better allocate staffing resources. If implemented, these strategies could improve patient satisfaction, patient discharge efficiency, and to support long term sustainability of the program.

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Poster 40) Chandler Coleman, Owen Jokinen, James Duhig, Andrea Best, Linda Scarazzini

Background: Communicating the risks of experimental drugs within informed consent forms is imperative for the safety of clinical trials. The literature suggests that the EU-recommended verbal risk descriptors (very rare, rare, uncommon, common, very common) for communicating the risk of experimental drugs contribute to a beter understanding of side effect likelihood. We aimed to determine how closely informed consent forms follow these recommended guidelines.

Objective: To assess how informed consent forms communicate the risks of the study drug.

Methods: We collected informed consent forms from Clinicaltrials.gov to examine how they communicated the side effects of experimental drugs. We evaluated the type of verbal risk descriptors used to describe side effect frequency. The use of percentages, absolute frequencies, and frequency bands with a verbal risk descriptor was also measured.

Results: The analytic cohort was composed of 547 English language ICFs. Of these, 104 ICFs (19%) gave no indication of side effect frequency. Furthermore, 88 ICFs (16.1%) paired an EC verbal descriptor with a frequency band, absolute frequency, or percentage, that displayed an inaccurate estimate of side effect likelihood. Only 20 ICFs (3.6%) matched EC verbal risk descriptors with the true probability of occurrence. None of the ICFs displayed risk visualizations to illustrate side effect frequency.

Conclusion: Informed consent forms often provide misleading and inadequate information pertaining to study drug side effects. This can contribute to inaccurate estimations of potential risks, leading to uninformed benefit-risk decision making regarding clinical trial enrollment. Standard guidance for presentation of side effects within ICFs can make risk communication more effective.

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