TY - JOUR T1 - Community pharmacist counseling improves adherence and asthma control: a nationwide observational study JF - European Respiratory Journal JO - Eur Respir J DO - 10.1183/13993003.congress-2021.PA3394 VL - 58 IS - suppl 65 SP - PA3394 AU - Barbara Putman AU - Anna Vanoverschelde AU - Els Mehuys AU - Louise Coucke AU - Lies Lahousse Y1 - 2021/09/05 UR - http://erj.ersjournals.com/content/58/suppl_65/PA3394.abstract N2 - Introduction: Pharmaceutical counseling (PC) interventions have been shown to improve adherence to controller medication and asthma control. However, the real-life impact of these PC interventions in difficult-to-control asthma patients remains unclear. We aimed to assess the effectiveness of PC interventions in real life using nationwide claims data.Methods: Demographics and drugs use of patients who received ICS in 2017 with or without pharmaceutical counseling were retrieved from a Belgian claims database. Asthma-related drug use from 1 year before first ICS dispensing in 2017 was compared with 1 year after. Outcomes were defined as daily dose (DDD) usage of inhaled corticosteroids (ICS), proportion of users of short-acting beta-agonist (SABA), antibiotics, oral corticosteroids (OCS), asthma biologicals and controller-to-total (CTT) ratio.Results: Study population consisted of difficult-to-control asthma patients aged 5-40 with at least 1 PC intervention within 90 days after first ICS dispensing (n=1350). ICS usage increased significantly 1 year after PC intervention compared with 1 year before (43.3 DDD/patient, p<0.05). A nominal decrease was observed in the proportion of SABA (48.0 to 46.2%) and antibiotics (54.5 to 52.7%) after PC intervention. CTT ratio significantly increased from 0.671 to 0.749 (p<0.05). The proportion of biological users was nominally lower in the intervention group compared with a control group in the post-intervention period (0.22% vs 0.30%).Conclusion: This first nationwide study among difficult-to-control asthma patients suggests that community pharmacist counseling is effective in real life to improve controller adherence and asthma control.FootnotesCite this article as: European Respiratory Journal 2021; 58: Suppl. 65, PA3394.This abstract was presented at the 2021 ERS International Congress, in session “Prediction of exacerbations in patients with COPD”.This is an ERS International Congress abstract. No full-text version is available. Further material to accompany this abstract may be available at www.ers-education.org (ERS member access only). ER -