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Community pharmacy-based hypertension disease-management program in a Latino/Hispanic-American population.

OBJECTIVE
To evaluate if the community, pharmacy-based hypertension disease-management (DM) program significantly improved patient's clinical outcomes and health-related quality of life (HRQOL) in a Latino/Hispanic-American community.


DESIGN
Quasi-experimental time-series study.


SETTINGS
The study was implemented at two primary-care clinics in health maintenance organizations and two community pharmacy settings located in South Florida.


PARTICIPANTS
Patients who have a long-term history of uncontrolled hypertension were identified and referred by their primary care physicians.


INTERVENTION
A nine-month, community pharmacy-based hypertension disease-management program.


MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES
HRQOL was assessed via SF-12 questionnaire and analyzed by norm-based scoring methods. Wilcoxon signed rank tests with 0.05 alpha levels were used to compare the differences in systolic blood pressure (SBP)/diastolic BP (DBP), medication compliance, and frequency of BP screenings between baseline and endpoint of the intervention.


RESULTS
A total of 53 patients (50.5%) completed the program. SBP/DBP significantly declined from 150.5/95.5 mmHg to 133.8/83.3 mmHg on the second month and remained consistent throughout the study period. Quality of life and mental component summary/physical component summary scores slightly increased from 48.58/46.68 to 50.39/51.51. The number of patients monitoring BP at home and medication compliance also significantly increased after nine months of intervention.


CONCLUSIONS
The key factor in accomplishing this DM program is meeting the health care needs of a unique population-the Hispanic-American community. Clinicians, administrators, and public health officials should note that understanding the broad parameters of a culture is essential to providing quality care to individuals, families, and communities.