Fact Sheet - Rx for Change Interventions Database

A first-in-class tool promoting optimal drug therapy
Rx for Change is a publicly accessible database for health care policy makers and health care professionals. It provides easy access to current research evidence about the effectiveness of strategies and programs to improve drug prescribing and use.

Reliable information readily available
There is much research offering new approaches on the clinical aspects of useful and efficient patient care, but changing clinical practice is often based on beliefs, rather than on scientific evidence. Rx for Change provides decision makers with reliable, up-to-date, evidence-based information to assist in the selection of behaviour-change strategies that promote the optimal use of medicines.

How to use Rx for Change
If you are looking to implement or initiate strategies to promote optimal drug therapy:

1. Visit the CADTH web site at www.cadth.ca or access the database directly at www.rxforchange.ca.

Here’s an example for its use: An organization or jurisdiction decides to address a specific concern regarding the prescribing of antibiotics. It sets aside funds to send out thousands of flyers to prescribers to influence prescribing behaviour. Before earmarking this money for flyers, the Rx for Change database can be used to determine if such a strategy actually affects behaviour. If the organization finds out that it does not − that there is evidence to indicate that it may be ineffective, or that there is not enough evidence that it is effective, to produce behaviour change − investment in an alternative method may be a good option.

2. Use the easy-to-browse categories to determine the type of behaviour-change strategy you are interested in: professional, consumer, organizational, financial, regulatory, or structural.

3. Scan the categories to find summaries of key findings from systematic reviews about the effects of interventions targeting professionals, health care organizations, policy makers, and consumers. Detailed analysis is also provided, including:

  • overall summaries of effects of interventions based on the evidence from systematic reviews
  • summaries of related individual reviews
  • quality assessments and summarized reviews which highlight key characteristics and relevant evidence for decision making
  • links to the individual studies included in each review.

Reviews targeting professionals, and financial, structural and organizational strategies, are defined and organized according to the intervention classification scheme of the Cochrane Effective Practice and Organisation of Care (EPOC) Review Group.

Reviews targeting consumers are defined and organized according to a unique scheme developed by the Cochrane Consumers and Communication Review Group.

This database is made available from the Canadian Agency for Drugs and Technologies in Health (CADTH), through its Canadian Optimal Medication Prescribing and Utilization Service (COMPUS). COMPUS, in collaboration with the Cochrane Effective Practice and Organisation of Care (EPOC) (www.epoc.cochrane.org) and the Cochrane Consumers and Communication Review Group (www.latrobe.edu.au/cochrane) developed this unique database. Funded by Health Canada, COMPUS identifies and promotes optimal drug therapy among health care providers and consumers.

Questions?

  • Call Janet Crain, Senior Communications Advisor, at CADTH (613) 226-2553.
  • Send an e-mail to rxforchange@cadth.ca.

www.rxforchange.ca