Appropriate Medication Use for Individuals With Intellectual Disabilities - A Matter of Life

The innovation idea is to develop valuable new knowledge about safe drug use in people with intellectual and/or developmental disabilities (IDDs). The main goal is to design a framework (routines and processes) that ensures safe drug use and provides qualitatively better services for people with IDDs. Secondary goals are that employees will experience better security when working with medicines, and interact better with people with IDD and relatives by implementing digital support functions. The innovation idea is specifically to develop/improve the following: 1) Medication management: Coordinating routines, procedures and work processes regarding all aspects of drug use, medication handling, and communication between care units for people with IDDs. 2) Medication therapy: Chart review of prescribed medication and gather knowledge about challenges related to drug use in this group. Based on this, we will develop new methods for drug reconciliation and medication reviews to optimize drug use. 3) New framework for safe drug use in the community-based services for people with IDDs.

Study Overview

• Status: Active, not recruiting
• Conditions: Disability, Developmental; Disabilities, Intellectual
• Intervention / Treatment: Other: Develop and implement the Framework for safe drug use in people with intellectual and/or developmental disabilities

Detailed Description

Changing, developing, and testing new routines, procedures, and communication methods for safe drug use is challenging. The complexity of systems that are involved in medication management makes it particularly challenging to create well-designed digital solutions that ensure good working procedures. The complex issues faced by people with IDDs, as well as developments within personalized medicine, means that it is crucial to build new knowledge, work in teams, and arrange for medication reconciliation and medication reviews to be carried out regularly. Furthermore, drug information must be provided, and adapted to the specific individual with an intellectual disability. In addition, the focus on personalized medicine means that the municipality must develop new guidelines for the use of pharmacogenetic tests so that the doctor can tailor drug selection and dosage to the individual patient.

• Study Type: Interventional
• Enrollment (Actual): 110
• Phase: Not Applicable

Contacts and Locations

Study Locations

• Norway
  • Leknes, Norway, 8370
    • Vestvågøy Municipality

Participation Criteria

Eligibility Criteria

• Ages Eligible for Study: Child; Adult; Older Adult
• Accepts Healthy Volunteers: No

Description

Inclusion Criteria:

• Users of the municipality's Service for people with disabilities

Exclusion Criteria:

-

Study Plan

How is the study designed?

Design Details

• Primary Purpose: Health Services Research
• Allocation: N/A
• Interventional Model: Single Group Assignment
• Masking: None (Open Label)

Number of Arms

1

Arms and Interventions

Participant Group / Arm

Intervention / Treatment

Other: Framework for safe drug use in people with intellectual and/or developmental disabilities; Optimizing medication management and medication therapy poses complex challenges related to the different groups, actors, and not least the data systems. To meet these challenges, we have chosen a method where the participants contribute actively in the research: participatory action research (PAR). This method involves both the action and the knowledge production being done in collaboration between all the participants, since neither the researcher nor others have exclusive right to the understanding of reality. Normalization process theory offers an analytical tool that helps to understand and explain the dynamic processes that occur during the implementation of complex interventions and technological and organizational innovations in health care, which includes institutional and organizational contexts and focuses on what social processes can promote and inhibit it through the integration of new routines and work forms in established social structures.

Other: Develop and implement the Framework for safe drug use in people with intellectual and/or developmental disabilities; Collection and analysis of drug lists and information about the users. Open / participatory observations of staff and residents during drug handling. Interviews/focus groups with residents, family, staff in the service, GPs and pharmacy staff. Interdisciplinary drug reviews based on the IMM method drug reviews, further developed by the researchers in the project. Design thinking. We use a design process with five stages: empathy, define, generate ideas, prototype and test. This involves user participation and experience to design the most optimal solution for the framework. Evaluate the framework, observations, interviews, questionnaires. Health economic evaluation.

What is the study measuring?

Primary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure	Measure Description	Time Frame
To understand what is safe drug therapy and drug handling in people with intellectual and/or developmental disabilities	Map which drugs each patient uses and carry out medication reconciliation (nurse and pharmacist) and medication review (nurse, pharmacist and general general practitioner). Interviews of employees, GPs and pharmacy staff.	12 months
Formulation of multidisciplinary frameworks for optimizing drug handling and drug therapy.	Design thinking and co-creation of multidisciplinary frameworks	18 months
Explore usefulness of multidisciplinary frameworks	Transcripts of qualitative feedback. Follow-up survey of employees, GPs, pharmacy staff, and people with intellectual and/or developmental disabilities. Health economic evaluation.	18 months

Collaborators and Investigators

• Sponsor: Vestvagoy Municipality
• Collaborators: University of Oslo; University of Tromso
• Investigators: Study Director: Heidi Wiik, MBA, Vestvågøy Municipality

Study record dates

Study Major Dates

• Study Start (Actual): August 15, 2023
• Primary Completion (Estimated): July 31, 2027
• Study Completion (Estimated): July 31, 2027

Study Registration Dates

• First Submitted: October 18, 2023
• First Submitted That Met QC Criteria: November 28, 2023
• First Posted (Actual): December 7, 2023

Study Record Updates

• Last Update Posted (Estimated): December 4, 2025
• Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria: November 26, 2025
• Last Verified: November 1, 2025

More Information

Terms related to this study

• Keywords: Intellectual Disabilities; Developmental Disabilities; Medication Therapy Management; Medication Reconciliation; Medication Review; Intersectoral Collaboration
• Additional Relevant MeSH Terms: Neurologic Manifestations; Nervous System Diseases; Mental Disorders; Neurobehavioral Manifestations; Neurodevelopmental Disorders; Pathological Conditions, Signs and Symptoms; Signs and Symptoms; Developmental Disabilities; Intellectual Disability
• Other Study ID Numbers: 22/658-6; Project number: 341297 (Other Grant/Funding Number: The Research Council of Norway)

Plan for Individual participant data (IPD)

• Plan to Share Individual Participant Data (IPD)?: NO

Drug and device information, study documents

• Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated drug product: No
• Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated device product: No
• product manufactured in and exported from the U.S.: No