BACKGROUND: Guidelines for pharmacy practitioners regarding various clinical pharmacy activities have been published in a number of countries. There is a need to review the guidelines and identify the scope of activities covered as a prelude to developing internationally acceptable common guidelines. AIM: To review the scope of clinical pharmacy guidelines and assess the extent to which these guidelines conform to quality standards as per the AGREE II instrument. METHOD: Medline, Embase, Guideline Central, International Pharmaceutical Abstracts, Google Scholar and Google (for grey literature) were searched for the period 2010 to January 2023. Guidelines which focused on any health care setting and any clinical pharmacy activity were included. Data were extracted and quality assessed independently by two reviewers using the English version of the AGREE II instrument. RESULTS: Thirty-eight guidelines were included, mostly originating from Australia (n = 10), Ireland (n = 8), UK (n = 7) and USA (n = 5). Areas covered included medication reconciliation, medicines optimisation, medication management and transition of care. As per the AGREE II assessment, the highest score was obtained for the scope and purpose domain and the lowest score for rigour of development, mainly due to non-consideration of literature/evidence to inform guideline development. CONCLUSION: Clinical pharmacy guidelines development processes need to focus on all quality domains and should take a systematic approach to guideline development. Guidelines need to further emphasise person-centred care and clinical communication. There is a scope to harmonise the guidelines internationally considering the diverse practices, standards and legislations across different geographies.

College of Pharmacy QU Health Qatar University Doha Qatar

Department of Clinical Pharmacology Bratislava University Hospital Bratislava Slovakia

Department of Clinical Pharmacy Faculty of Pharmacy Marmara University Istanbul Türkiye

Department of Clinical Pharmacy Innsbruck University Innsbruck Austria

Department of Geriatrics and Gerontology 1st Faculty of Medicine Charles University Prague Czech Republic

Department of Pharmacy University of Malta Msida Malta

Department of Social and Clinical Pharmacy Faculty of Pharmacy in Hradec Králové Charles University Hradec Králové Czech Republic

Julius Centre for Health Sciences and Primary Care University Medical Center Utrecht Utrecht The Netherlands

Kantonsspital Aarau Aarau Switzerland

School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences Trinity College Dublin Dublin Ireland

School of Pharmacy College of Medical and Dental Sciences Sir Robert Aitken Institute for Medical Research University of Birmingham Edgbaston Birmingham UK

Trinity College Dublin Dublin Ireland

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European Society of Clinical Pharmacy: 'the prescribing pharmacist: a prescription for better patient care'