Use of medications in the home among foreign-born persons with language difficulties

The aim is to study use of medications in the home by foreign-born people or their relatives, identified by healthcare staff as having language difficulties that may pose a safety risk in connection with medication use, and what support is needed to optimize use of medications in the home. The area will be studied from different perspectives to get a comprehensive understanding of the phenomenon.

Based on the results in a co-creation process, a model for support to ensure safe care in the home to prevent medication errors will be developed as the first step of a complex health intervention.

Methods for data collection include: 1) interviews and participant observations (with interpreter) in the home of foreign-born persons when taking medications or being supported by relatives, 2) interviews, incident reports of medication errors and written stories by staff in healthcare and pharmacies on information exchange in a case study of a healthcare centre with connected pharmacies, and 3) focus-group discussions with respondents from all groups to develop the model.

With its interdisciplinary approach and its focus on different dimensions of medication use in the home and communication in the healthcare chain and how to best organize supportive care, the project will contribute to a research field that is under-studied, yet important to ensure involvement and equality in a multilingual context and generate knowledge of clinical relevance in primary healthcare and education.