Development of patient-centred performance indicators to guide the delivery of pharmaceutical care in a district general hospital.

The aim of this study was to audit clinical pharmacy practice in an acute hospital setting against the individual patient care guidelines set out in the CRAG "Framework for Practice" document, and then to develop practical, patient-centred performance indicators that could be used locally to monitor the delivery of pharmaceutical care. A series of four audits were undertaken to establish key elements in the process of providing pharmaceutical care to patients. Four standard statements describing the performance of the pharmacy service in providing patient care were developed through peer discussion and formulation of ideas based around these data. The four standard statements were then used as performance indicators to evaluate service performance at PRI and tested by means of a further audit cycle. The use of this methodology facilitated operation of a structured service appraisal system and provided a forum that allowed problems with practice to be discussed and resolved.