TY - JOUR T1 - Medication reviews JF - European Journal of Hospital Pharmacy JO - Eur J Hosp Pharm SP - 189 LP - 190 DO - 10.1136/ejhpharm-2015-000669 VL - 22 IS - 4 AU - Robert Janknegt Y1 - 2015/07/01 UR - http://ejhp.bmj.com/content/22/4/189.abstract N2 - Medicines management is an essential part of high-quality patient care in hospitals, homes for the elderly and nursing homes, as well as in primary care. Polypharmacy is an important risk factor for adverse drug events and drug interactions. We know that adverse drug events are associated with a prolonged hospital stay, higher mortality rate and increased costs, also the risk of adverse drug events is likely to grow due to the increasing age of hospitalised patients.A medication review is a critical evaluation of a patient's medication list with the intention to optimise therapy in a structured way using available clinical and pharmaceutical information as well as laboratory data.This themed issue highlights the various aspects of such reviews in a variety of patient populations, including the elderly, nursing home patients, oncology patients and other hospitalised patients. Studies from six European countries are included.The article by Bart van der Bemt1 is important because it makes a clear distinction between various aspects of medication review and puts this into a broader perspective by means of the Medication Therapy Management Pyramid.Whereas most articles in this supplement focus on the top layer of this pyramid (medication review), the article on the so-called ‘integrated medicines management’ (IMM) programme from the team of Michael Scott from Northern Ireland covers all aspects of the pyramid.2IMM is a multifaceted approach including admission, inpatient care and discharge, medication appropriateness, medicines administration and antimicrobial stewardship. These led to a major reduction of medication errors during admission, 5.5 interventions per patient in inpatient care, a reduced length of stay (by 2 days), increased time to readmission (+20 days), faster medication rounds (–25 min) and faster discharge (–90 min) together with major reduction in errors during discharge. These interventions were combined with Safe Therapeutic Economic Pharmaceutical Selection, which … Correspondence to Dr Robert Janknegt, Atrium-Orbis Medical Centre, P.O. Box 5500, Sittard 6130 MB, the Netherlands; r.janknegt{at}orbisconcern.nl ER -