RESEARCH ARTICLE Problems, interventions, and their outcomes during the routine work of hospital pharmacists in Bosnia and Herzegovina Gordana Ljubojevic ´ 1 • Branislava Miljkovic ´ 2 • Tatjana Buc ´ma 1 • Milica C ´ ulafic ´ 2 • Milica Prostran 3 • Sandra Vezmar Kovac ˇevic ´ 2 Received: 18 April 2016 / Accepted: 18 May 2017 Ó Springer International Publishing 2017 Abstract Background In the last 30 years, activities of hospital pharmacists have gone through significant chan- ges. Pharmacists are increasingly involved in patient care. Objectives To explore drug-related and logistic problems, interventions, and their outcomes during routine everyday work of hospital pharmacists. Setting Institute for physical medicine and rehabilitation, Banja Luka, Bosnia and Herzegovina. Methods In the period of January 2013–Oc- tober 2015 a prospective observational study was per- formed. Medical doctors, nurses, therapists, and patients addressed pharmacists, face-to-face or by telephone, with drug-related problems (DRPs) and/or logistic issues. Main outcome measure Type of DRP or logistic issue, inter- vention, outcome, initiator and time spent for solving the problem were documented for each consultation. Results Out of 1515 interventions, 48.8% were aimed at solving DRPs. The most common DRPs were the recommendation of a drug or dose and need for additional information about drugs. Drug price and supply were the most prevalent logistic issues. DRPs were more frequently initiated by medical doctors and required more time to solve the problem compared to logistic issues (Mann–Whitney U test, p B 0.001, respectively). The acceptance rate of interventions to solve DRPs (83.7%) was lower compared to logistic issues (95.2%; p B 0.001). Conclusions Hospital pharmacists were faced with an approximately equal number of DRPs and logistic issues during their routine everyday work. The overall acceptance rate of pharmacists’ interventions was high, and the results of our study indicate that there is a need for more involvement of hospital pharmacists in Bosnia and Herzegovina in clinical activi- ties. Impact on practice. Keywords Bosnia and Herzegovina Á Drug-related problems Á Hospital pharmacists Á Interventions Á Logistic issues Á Outcomes Impacts on practice • Hospital pharmacists in Bosnia and Herzegovina are faced with both drug-related problems and logistic issues during routine work every day. • Patients, as well as medical doctors could benefit from more involvement of hospital pharmacists in identify- ing and solving drug-related problems. • In Bosnia and Herzegovina more pharmacists per 100 patient beds would be necessary for the development of a patient care service aimed at identifiying and resolving drug-related problems. Introduction The role of pharmacists in a hospital setting has been changing towards clinical activities in the last 30 years. Clinical pharmacy services oriented towards the appro- priate and cost-effective use of medications have shown & Sandra Vezmar Kovac ˇevic ´ svezmar@pharmacy.bg.ac.rs 1 Institute for Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, Dr Miroslav Zotovic ´, Banja Luka, Bosnia and Herzegovina 2 Department of Pharmacokinetics and Clinical Pharmacy, Faculty of Pharmacy, University of Belgrade, Vojvode Stepe 450, Belgrade 11000, Serbia 3 Department of Pharmacology, Clinical Pharmacology and Toxicology, Faculty of Medicine, University of Belgrade, Belgrade, Serbia 123 Int J Clin Pharm DOI 10.1007/s11096-017-0491-x