How Do Physicians Conduct Medication Reviews?

BACKGROUND: Medication reviews are recommended annually for older patients. A medication review is a discussion of a patient’s complete set of medications, but the actual content of a review is not well specified. The medical literature suggests that it is an exhaustive evaluation, but what physicians actually ask about their patients’ medication regimens has been little studied. OBJECTIVE: To describe what physicians do when they review medications in the office setting. METHODS: Qualitative content analysis of audio-taped encounters between 100 patients aged 65 and older and 28 primary care physicians in two health care systems in Sacramento, California. RESULTS: Physicians use a combination of non-mutually exclusive strategies when reviewing chronic medications that include: (1) efforts to obtain a complete list of patient medications (36% of visits), (2) discussion of a topic related to the management of each of a patient’s chronic medications (47% of visits), and (3) sequential discussion of the majority of a patient’s medications without intervening discussion (45% of visits). Of 10 medication management topics that were discussed in medication reviews, a mean of 1.5 topics (SD = 1.7, range 0–7) were mentioned for each medication, with efficacy and directions being most common. Physicians conducted a sequential discussion that included discussion of each of a patient’s medications in only 32% of visits. CONCLUSIONS: Comprehensive discussions about chronic medications are uncommon in routine practice. Practical conceptualization of what constitutes a physician-conducted medication review is needed.