Effects of Drug-related Problem Interventions by Hospital Pharmacists in Patients with Mild-to-moderate COVID-19

COVID-19 has been downgraded from a Class 2 disease to a Class 5 disease under the Infectious Disease Control Law in Japan on May 8, 2023. Previously, patients with COVID-19 were treated in specialized isolation wards. Patients with mild-to-moderate COVID-19 are now being treated in general wards, similar to seasonal influenza. Thus, more clinical pharmacists should be involved in COVID-19 patient care. Although the effects of pharmacological interventions for severe COVID-19 have been reported, they have not been reported for mild-to-moderate COVID-19. In this study, we evaluated the effects of pharmacological interventions for drug-related problems (DRPs) in patients with mild-to-moderate COVID-19 symptoms. We investigated patients hospitalized in isolation wards exclusively for COVID-19 from January 2022 to March 2023 at our institution. Among the 393 patients enrolled, 271 DRPs were identified by clinical pharmacists. There were 48 and 223 DRPs related to COVID-19 treatment and other factors, respectively. Clinical pharmacists provided 271 interventions on DRPs, of which 247 (91.1％) were accepted by the prescriber. These results indicate that patients with mild-to-moderate COVID-19 frequently receive DRPs, and clinical pharmacist interventions have positive effects on COVID-19 treatment and medication safety.