Manuscripts published prior to 2004 tended not to specify a study design as they primarily described clinical programmes. In the nine studies published after 2004 that did declare a study design, only in five cases did the listed study design agree with a study design

that would have been ascribed using Cochrane Collaboration guidelines.[35] Over time, manuscripts BGB324 about HIV pharmacists increasingly included CD4+ cell counts, HIV viral load and adherence as outcome measures (15% in papers published prior to 2004 versus 53% in papers published in 2004 and after). Manuscripts that measured adherence as an outcome typically described the adherence calculation well (8 of 9 studies) and most manuscripts provided some information about the study pharmacist’s qualifications or background training LY2606368 (11 of 22 studies). Our search found that the majority of research studies evaluating HIV pharmacist interventions used pre-post observational study designs. After 2004, these observational studies began to examine the impact of pharmacist services on HIV clinical outcomes such as CD4+ cell count and HIV viral load.[4] Despite these enhancements, published observational studies of HIV pharmacists failed to report a substantial

amount of critical information suggested by established manuscript guidelines. Randomized studies of HIV pharmacist interventions represent an even greater step forward towards demonstrating the value of HIV pharmacists. Yet, there did not appear to be an increasing trend in publication of rigorous randomized studies of HIV pharmacists as only three of these studies were identified (2004, 2005 and 2010) and included in our evaluation. In general, adequacy of reporting critical information was much improved in these three papers, and pertinent HIV clinical outcomes were often included as primary or secondary measures. One limitation to our study is that most of the manuscripts we evaluated were published prior to the availability of the STROBE and CONSORT

guidelines, or were very published in journals that do not endorse these guidelines. Our review illustrates where HIV pharmacist literature stands under current reporting recommendations, and identifies areas where HIV pharmacist literature might continue to improve in reporting. This is a moving target because good reporting principles may evolve over time. Many of the observational studies we evaluated were descriptive and did not include a comparator group. STROBE criteria may be more applicable to observational cohorts with more than one group. Various tools to evaluate reporting in observational or non-randomized study designs exist, and our evaluation was limited only to STROBE. Though CONSORT guides the interpretation of its criteria with supportive explanations, STROBE criteria were more subject to interpretation.