The Pharmaceutical Care Network Europe (PCNE) was established in 1994 and it became an official association (under Dutch law) in 2004.
Pharmaceutical Care is the pharmacist's contribution to the care of individuals, in order to optimize medicines use and improve health outcomes.
PCNE Working group on Medication Adherence
Medication non-adherence is a global problem and subject of thousands of publications. For practicality reasons, questionnaires are widely used to assess (non)-adherence but every available instrument has shortcomings. Despite these challenges, valid and reliable instruments are needed for research and pharmacy practice to assess (non)-adherence within phases of initiation, implementation, or persistence. Further, instruments should be available in different languages and free of charge for all researchers and practitioners. This working group was founded during the General Assembly in 2022 and contributes to this field.
The 15-STARS is a novel questionnaire to screen for non-adherence that was developed within this working group. It is now available for all interested researchers and practioners free of charge (Publication by Arnet et al in RSAP available at: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sapharm.2023.11.005). Translated versions are currently available in:
Other languages are in progress:
If you are interested to use the 15-STARS please contact the working group leaders for a permission to use. It is freely available but we want to keep track of its use. If your language is not available yet, please also contact us. If you are interested to translate the 15-STARS in your language, you will be asked to use the preferred methods of translation of the 15-STARS and hand in a short report on translation and cultural adaptation.
Contact persons for this working group are: Christiane Eickhoff (c.eickhoff@abda.de) and Isabelle Arnet (isabelle.arnet@unibas.ch).
