Pharmacovigilance Thesis Topics for PharmD

Tier 1 - High Impact, Highly Publishable

• Example: "Prospective surveillance of adverse drug reactions in a medical ICU/oncology unit/nephrology ward"
• Design: Prospective observational, 6-12 months
• Why it works: directly generates new ADR data, uses WHO-UMC causality scale, Naranjo algorithm, highly publishable in safety journals
• Reference: recent meta-analysis on ADR reporting strategies

• Example: "Prevalence and clinical significance of potential drug-drug interactions in polypharmacy patients admitted to a tertiary care hospital"
• Design: Cross-sectional or prospective, use Micromedex/Lexi-Interact to screen prescriptions
• Why it works: very feasible, clear endpoints, relevant to patient safety

• Example: "Assessment of ADR reporting practices and barriers among physicians and nurses in a teaching hospital"
• Design: Structured questionnaire-based survey + review of spontaneous reporting records
• Why it works: fills a known gap (global underreporting rate is >90%), results directly usable for hospital policy

Tier 2 - Disease-Specific Safety Monitoring

• Example: "Immune-related adverse events (irAEs) in patients receiving PD-1/PD-L1 inhibitors at a cancer center"
• Design: Retrospective or prospective cohort
• Why it works: immunotherapy is booming; irAEs are poorly documented in local/regional populations; strong publication potential
• Current evidence: FAERS + clinical trial analysis, PMID 38745663

• Example: "Adverse drug reactions to antibiotics in hospitalized patients and their impact on treatment outcomes"
• Design: Prospective, tie into the hospital's antibiotic stewardship program
• Why it works: infection management is universal; antibiotic-related ADRs (C. diff, nephrotoxicity, QT prolongation) are clinically important

• Example: "Potentially inappropriate medications and adverse outcomes in elderly inpatients: a pharmacovigilance perspective"
• Design: Cross-sectional using Beers Criteria or STOPP/START criteria
• Why it works: geriatric polypharmacy is a major public health issue; Beers criteria gives you a ready-made framework

Tier 3 - Emerging and Tech-Driven Topics

• Example: "Detection and analysis of medication errors in a tertiary care hospital using a trigger tool approach"
• Design: Retrospective record review using Institute for Healthcare Improvement (IHI) Global Trigger Tool
• Why it works: medication errors are distinct from ADRs but equally reportable; produces actionable hospital data

• Example: "Safety profile of fixed-dose combinations used in chronic disease management: a prospective study"
• Focus on: TB/HIV FDCs, antihypertensives, diabetes combinations
• Why it works: FDCs are widely used, regulatory concerns exist about their safety data, good local relevance

• Example: "Mining electronic medical records for drug safety signals: a pilot study"
• Design: Retrospective data mining using disproportionality analysis (ROR, PRR methods)
• Why it works: introduces you to signal detection methods used by the WHO Uppsala Monitoring Centre; cutting edge for a PharmD thesis

• Example: "Adverse drug reactions associated with medications used in pregnancy at a tertiary obstetric unit"
• Design: Prospective observational
• Why it works: pregnancy pharmacovigilance is a major gap globally; ethical, meaningful, and high impact

How to Decide

Next Steps

1. Narrow your focus - pick 2-3 from above that match your hospital's patient population
2. Talk to your thesis guide - check if similar work was already done at your institution
3. Do a quick literature search - confirm the gap and find 5-10 recent papers to justify the need
4. Check feasibility - ethics committee timelines, data access, ward cooperation, sample size