Introduction: Opioids are essential medicines, but their use is associated with risks. The POP program "Prevention and risk reduction of Opioid-related overdoses in the PACA region" aims to improve the management of patients at risk of overdose and the distribution of naloxone. We have conducted a survey of pharmacist with the aim was to assess their knowledge, practices, difficulties and needs concerning the management of opioid users and overdose prevention and naloxone diffusion, and to propose training materials adapted to their needs.
Materials and methods: In the context of POP programme, pharmacists were approached via an online questionnaire (February-March 2024) and semi-structured interviews (April 2024).
Results: A total of 107 pharmacists completed the questionnaire and 10 took part in the interviews. Seventy-four per cent said they had encountered patients with opioid misuse disorders. Awareness of the Prescription Opioid Misuse Index was low (92%). Only 37% of pharmacists said they were aware of the availability of take-home naloxone, and 87% were uncomfortable with the advice associated with it is dispensing. Actions in the event of misuse included contacting the prescriber (76%), refusing to dispense (76%), and adapting or splitting dispensing (60%). In terms of needs, 95% were interested in training, 44% in practical tools, and 41% in documents for patients. Based on the needs expressed, information and outreach actions were carried out.
Conclusion: The results highlight the need to improve pharmacists knowledge on overdose risk and naloxone. Regular training and the dissemination of practical tools are essential.
Purpose: This study has two main objectives: 1/ to validate the International Classification of Diseases, 10th revision (ICD-10) diagnostic codes of skin ulcer in one French hospital using medical charts; 2/ to validate an out-hospital algorithm against ICD-10 codes using a healthcare database.
Methods: We first validated in-hospital ICD-10 codes for pressure, diabetic and vascular skin ulcers using the Grenoble University Hospital medical charts. Secondly, we assessed the validity of an out-hospital algorithm using dressing reimbursements, medical exams and comorbidities to identify skin ulcers using the French "échantillon généraliste des benéficiaires" database. We then compared the type of skin ulcers in patients hospitalized 1 year around the out-hospital skin ulcer identification date. We calculated specificity, sensitivity, positive predictive value (PPV) and negative predictive value (NPV).
Results: The performances of ICD-10 codes for identifying patients with vascular, diabetic and pressure ulcers were all superior to 70%. The out-hospital identification of skin ulcers selected very different patients, younger and with less comorbidities than those hospitalized for skin ulcers. In patients hospitalized 1 year before or after the first dispensation of wound dressings, the concordance with ICD-10 codes was modest. Indeed, patients are wrongly classified as pressure ulcers, vascular ulcers and diabetic foot ulcers in respectively 27.7%, 52.0% and 48.8% of skin ulcers.
Conclusion: We found that performances of the in-hospital identification of pressure, vascular and diabetic foot ulcers were high allowing to use them to conduct observational studies in healthcare databases. However, outpatient identification retrieved heterogeneous performance, we therefore advise researchers using the latter to perform a sensitivity analysis restricted to hospitalized patients.