Invited speakers

Workshop qualitative methods

Introduction

Qualitative methods are used to explore and understand meanings, experiences, views, real life practices et cetera. While originating from the social sciences these methods are now commonly used also within other areas, for example social pharmacy. As social pharmacy research, among other things, deals with perspectives of medicine users, health care professionals, policy makers, and medicine practices, qualitative methods are important tools for researchers within the field. Hence, whether you yourself will conduct qualitative research or not, there is a need for understanding what qualitative methods can do, and how to understand results from this kind of studies.

This workshop will cover the basics of qualitative research. This includes: the underlying epistemology of qualitative methodology, methods used, and why and when to use them. In addition, some specific aspects, such as strategies of sampling and analysis will be introduced as well as how to interpret and use findings from qualitative research.

Objective

The aim of the workshop is to present and discuss the basics of qualitative research.

Learning outcomes

After attending the workshop, participants will have a basic understanding of

• - The place of qualitative research within social pharmacy
• - Why and when to use qualitative methods
• - Some aspects of qualitative research, especially sampling and analysis strategies
• - How to assess and use outcomes of qualitative research.

Workshop quantitative epidemiological methods

Introduction

Quantitative epidemiological methods can be descriptive or analytical, and both types are increasingly used in the Nordic countries due to the availability of national health registry data and large population-based cohorts.

This workshop will first cover the fundamental epidemiological methods for quantitative analyses, including a description of data availability in the Nordic countries and practical study examples. Next, the workshop will cover more advanced methods for quantitative analyses, including approaches to minimize confounding and biases, and how to evaluate whether associations can be causal. During the workshop, you will also learn how to critically appraise observational study results.

Objective

The aim of the workshop is to present and discuss the fundamentals and more advanced principles of quantitative research.

Learning outcomes

After attending the workshop, participants will have a basic understanding of

• The place of quantitative research within social pharmacy
• Opportunities for research using national health registry data in the Nordic countries
• Fundamental and more advanced methods for quantitative epidemiological research
• How to minimize multiple sources of biases and confounding in quantitative research
• How to critically appraise results of quantitative research based on observational data

Plenary session (Wednesday): Human factors and other methods to improve medication safety in pharmacies.

Michelle A. Chui, PharmD, PhD, FAPhA is the Hammel-Sanders Distinguished Professor and the Chair of the Social & Administrative Sciences Division in the UW-Madison School of Pharmacy. She is the Director of the Sonderegger Research Center for Improved Medication Outcomes which is a forum that unites scholars, students, practitioners, funders, and policy makers in the creation of innovative approaches that address medication use issues. She is the Co-Director of the UW Institute for Clinical and Translational Research TL1 pre-doctoral and post-doctoral program, has mentored over 40 successful trainees, including graduate students, TL1 and KL2 trainees, residents, and pharmacy students.

Her research focuses on applying human factors engineering approaches to improving medication safety in the outpatient setting. She has published over 100 peer reviewed manuscripts and book chapters. Most recently, she has been funded by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) to test a systems redesign intervention to improve over-the-counter medication safety (R18HS024490, R18HS027737) and to evaluate CancelRx, a health IT functionality to reduce medication discrepancies (R21HS025793). Her lab received the Best Paper Award in the Research in Social and Administrative Pharmacy journal (2022) and Exploratory Research in Clinical and Social Pharmacy journal (2023).

Plenary session (Friday): The new Norwegian pharmacy legislation - implications for pharmaceutical care services

Urd Andestad is president of the Norwegian Association of Pharmacists. She graduated as a master of Pharmacy from the University in Tromsø in 2005. At the time she started working at the Norwegian Medicines Agency, with reimbursement of pharmaceuticals. Moving on to the Diretorate of Health and the administration of the general reimbursement for medical equipment and diatery products from 2010 until 2015. In 2016 she began as the Market access manager for Norway, Denmark and Iceland in Abbott, until taking the Presidency in the Norwegian Association of Pharmacists in 2021. The Association is the largest association for pharmacists in Norway with around 5 000 pharmacists, working to secure the members’ financial, social, and professional interests. In 2021 she was appointed as a member of the official group to assess the legislation for pharmacies.  

Plenary session (Friday): Pharmaceutical Care Services in Scotland – The Future Is Now!

Matt graduated in 1999 from Strathclyde University. After his pre-registration year he worked as a community pharmacist for over ten years gaining considerable experience in various localities. He also qualified as an independent prescriber in 2008 delivering hypertension services from his community pharmacy practice for patients.
His journey so far with CPS has taken him to the role of Director of Operations and deputy CEO. This is a great challenge and privilege to lead the dedicated team internally as they aim to deliver a robust, professional and sustainable community pharmacy support service for the pharmacy network. He also provides a policy and advocacy function on behalf of members and is a member of the CPS negotiating team. Matt also still practices as a community pharmacist locum and is a Fellow of the Royal Pharmaceutical Society

Plenary session (Thursday): AI and Big Data new opportunities in healthcare and pharmacy

Dr. Lars Ailo Bongo is currently a professor in health technology at the Department of Computer Science, UiT The Arctic University of Norway. He is the principal investigator in the Health Data Lab. His main research interest is to build and experimentally evaluate infrastructure systems that support the methods under development by our bioinformatics and health science collaborators.  Bongo is also active in building a culture for entrepreneurship at UiT, He is the co-founder of Medsensio AS, innovation coordinator in SFI Visual Intelligence, and the co-founder of the Digital Technology Innovation Lab at UiT.

Dr. Kristian Svendsen is an associate professor at the Department of Pharmacy at  UiT The Arctic University of Norway. His main research is in the use of medications and how to use data to explore various aspects of medication use. He is also involved in clinical studies, machine learning projects, and more social pharmacy related projects. He collaborates with the Health Data Lab of Professor Bongo and he has an interest in how technology can change the working day of pharmacists.

Plenary session (Friday): Perspectives on Pharmaceutical Care Services for Indigenous People

Dr. Susanna Ragnhild Andersdatter Siri, MPh, PhD, is researcher at the Centre for Sami Health Research (CSHR) which is responsible for the SAMINOR Study and cooperates with various research teams involved in health research in indigenous communities in Canada, the USA, Australia, New Zealand, Denmark/Greenland and Sweden. SAMINOR is the population-based study on health and living conditions in regions with Sami and Norwegian populations. Her research has been focused on risk factors and incidence of cardiovascular diseases in Sami and non-Sami populations. She is also engaged in the SAMINOR biobank (collection, storage, and use of the biological material collected in SAMINOR).

She currently leads two SAMINOR projects: 1) Quality control of DNA extracted from SST-clot samples from the SAMINOR 1 and SAMINOR 2 Surveys, and 2) Best Practice of Sámi Governance of Research Data, in collaboration with Umeå University, Sweden, and Lapland University, Finland.

Plenary session (Wednesday): Innovations in pharmacy; Challenges in implementing a common journal system in Norwegian health care; Helseplattformen

Janne Kutschera Sund, MPharm, is currently the CPIO (Chief Pharmacy and medicines Information Officer) in Helseplattformen AS.  Janne has a broad experience from hospital pharmacy, teaching and training, research, clinical pharmacology, patient safety and quality assurance.  

Helseplattformen (HP) is implementing a new shared Electronic Health Record for all parts of the health care system in the region of Central Norway: the health care trusts with their hospitals and specialist care, municipalities with nursing homes, home care services, prison health care, refugee health care and emergency departments, end GPs. In the medication area HP is giving this region their first electronic medication chart, a shared medication list for health care personnel and the patients themselves, generic prescribing and closing of the medication loop with barcode scanning and decision support for ordering, dispensing and administration of meds.   

Trondheim Municipality started using HP in May 2022. Since then, St. Olav’s University Hospital in Trondheim, Orkanger and Røros and 9 other municipalities in the region has joined Trondheim. HP has currently 28.000 end users.

Janne will talk about the process of tailoring the solution to the Norwegian setting, experience with readiness, planning, training, implementation and maintenance of this huge change and standardization project.