Department News 2025/26
NOV / DEC 2025
It’s been a very busy end of year and so much has happened, which is summarised below.
At the start of November, we welcomed two ERASMUS+ students from the University of Iceland. Hrafnhildur Kara Krístínsdóttir und Ásta Sóley Jónsdóttir will be with us for 6 months and will be conducting their research as part of their master’s in pharmacy with us. Both will be conducting focus group studies as part of our wider delirium research.
We had the pleasure of presenting our work at the European Delirium Association conference in Hamburg. “Delirium: Many Factors, One Approach”. Posters presented included:
In research terms we had more publishing success:
- Brincat, A., Tonna, A., Vella Bonanno, P., Stewart, D., Weidmann, AE. Colorectal cancer patients’ experiences with antineoplastic agents from the perspective of their significant others: A longitudinal qualitative study. Int J Clin Pharm (2025). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11096-025-01976-2
- Tadic, I., Weidmann AE. Anticholinergic medicines - medication management, prescribing cascades, and deprescribing. International Journal of Clinical Pharmacy, 2025. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11096-025-01965-5.
- Tadic, I., Fialová, D., Hazen, A., C. Henman, M., Okuyan, B., Wirth, F., … E. Weidmann, A. (2025). Current Practices on Prescribing and Deprescribing for Patients on Long-Term Antibiotic Treatment for Chronic Pulmonary Conditions: An Umbrella Review by the European Society of Clinical Pharmacy (ESCP). COPD: Journal of Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease, 22(1). https://doi.org/10.1080/15412555.2025.2532076
Our team attended the the APOkongress 2025 event and our own Danielle presented on the topic of AI in pharmacy practice at the Austrian Association of Hospital Pharmacists (AAHP) in Salzburg.
On the topic of education, we had a great six week run of current pharmacy topic discussions with some very interesting communication workshops with final year Master of Pharmacy students. We had Dr. Helen Vosper educate us on the importance of human factors in patient safety and we worked hard as an institution to develop a new BA/MA curriculum for pharmacy.
Last but not least, huge congratulations to Dr. Jasmin Stoll who successfully defended her PhD thesis entitled “Development and extension of the interdisciplinary role profile of pharmacists in Austria”. Thank you to Prof. Dr. Scott Cunningham, Univerisity of New South Wales, Australia and Prof. Ulrika Gillespie, University of Uppsala who assessed the thesis and conducted the defense. Thank you also to: Dr. Monika Lutters, (Kontonspital Aarau), Dr. Birgit Böhmdorfer-McNair (Klinik Hitzing) und Karl Landsteiner (Institut, Wien) und Prof. Dr. Tobias Dreischulte (LMU München) who supported the research as the supervisory team.
The year ended with a very spcial accolade for our team as Univ.Prof. Dr. Anita Weidmann was chosen by the pharmacy students to receive the inaugural Lecturer of the Year award. This is such a special prize to win, as it is solely chosen by the students and being the recipient is almost impossible to put in words. Our team is passionate about pharmacy education to equip our students with the skills they need to provide cutting edge healthcare. “Good teachers are those who show you where to look but don’t tell you what to see.”
Thank you to all our wonderful students, thank you for staying open minded, inquisitive, critical and for challenging us with great questions. Thank you to the best team in the world who work hard in their own teaching to live our values and support me in our mission and thank you to the univeristy for providing an environment that allows teaching to expand and be different, innovative and nourishing.
We wish you all a wonderful christmas and a great and safe start to 2026!
OCT 2025
The new Semester has started, and we are excited to welcome our new MSc Students:
- Susanne Schwendinger
- Nina Sedelmeier
- Christoph Weichhard
- Berfin Acikbas
- Gabi Cernov
- Karina Phillips
We look forward to working with you on some interesting partners both across Austria and Germany. We also welcome the latest addition to our Team. Vanessa Furch will be joining us as a research assistant for 1 day a week. Welcome Vanessa, lovely to have you on the team.
With the new Semester starting, our focus has shiften onto teaching leaving less time for research news. We were however honoured to partake in a podium discussion between Austrian pharmacy owners, the chamber of pharmacy and pharmacy students at Apo+ Theke on the 9.10. Considering the Motto, “The future is now” we discussed interesting aspects of the future education, social media influence and impact of modern technology on our developing role profile. It was great to mix with so many interested students from across all Semester. You can read all about the event here: https://www.ots.at/presseaussendung/OTS_20251014_OTS0019/the-future-is-now-oesterreichischer-apothekerverband-lud-zum-austausch-der-generationen-in-innsbruck
We also partook at the Austrian Patient Safety Congress on the 17th of October in Vienna. The congress focused on the WHO topic - Patient safety risks in children and saw a wide interdisciplinary representation from many different healthcare colleagues. We delivered a keynote on Medication therapy safety in children and learned the value of simulation centres in practice and training to ensure continuous adaptations of teams and real-life training. For photos and talks follow this link: https://plattform-patientensicherheit.at/bildung-2025.php
Lastly, we were proud to be part of the development of a national guideline on medication therapy safety measures required in all Austrian hospitals. A piece commissioned by the „Österreichische Fachgesellschaft für Qualität und Sicherheit im Gesundheitswesen (ASQS)”. It saw 14 healthcare experts work together to develop a guideline that makes 21 practice recommendations to ensure medication therapy safety and provide a gold standard across Austrian hospitals. The aim is to have these turned into a future legal framework. The guideline was presented at the Event on "Arzneimitteltherapiesicherheit - Herausforderungen und Lösungsansätze von der Verschreibung bis zur Einnahme" for the first time.
We are honoured to have the opportunity to continuously help to develop medication therapy safety aspects across the healthcare system in Austria and beyond.
SEPT 2025
Lots of news coming up, as we have been busy!
First of all we are proud to have co-authored the AI Special issue: Innovative technologies and artificial intelligence. International Journal of Clinical Pharmacy, Special Issue, August 2025 https://link.springer.com/journal/11096/volumes-and-issues/47-4. Thanks to Prof. Hoti and Prof. Stewart for this phenomenal collaborative work.
Following hot on the heals of her PhD Thesis submission, Jasmin presented the final results of her thesis at the World Pharmacy Congress (FIP) in Copenhagen. She had two oral presentations and a poster. Well done Jasmin!
During the middle of September, Prof. Weidmann had the privilege of working at the University of Iceland as part of an ERASMUS+ teaching mobility grant. She met all our past and future pharmacy research students and had plenty of in-depth discussions with Faculty staff about how to advance curricula and practice teaching using AI. We also presented our research results on the CoMEd study in delirium which is a collaborative project between the University of Innsbruck, Iceland, Queen's University University Belfast and University Duisburg Essen as well as the Landspitali Hospital, Reykjavik and the University Hospital in Innsbruck. The hybrid event saw lots of colleagues from all institutions represented both in attendance and online.
On the 23rd of September, Prof. Weidmann was privileged to take part in an invited plenary debate on the “Future of Pharmacy in Europe” at the European Parliament in Brussels. The event, organised by the Pharmacy Group Europe (PgEU) tabled the very important topic of how evidence on the impact of services on health outcomes and health economics can be translated into policy and practice. Thank you to the other panel members Prof. Dr. Natasha Azzopardi-Muscat, Director, Division of Health Systems, WHO Regional Office for Europe; Candan Kendir, Health Policy Analyst, OECD and Solène Jouan, Policy Officer, European Patients Forum.
You can read the Article in The Parliament Magazine here: https://www.theparliamentmagazine.eu/partner/article/shaping-the-future-of-pharmacy-services-in-europe
In the final week of September three of our students presented their research at the European Geriatric Medicine (EuGMS) congress. Aqeel Aslam, presented the results of his Systematic review on “Medication risks associated with delirium in Delirium superimposed on dementia”; Kristin Brynjarsdottir presented the results of her focus group study entitled “Use of Antipsychotics on delirium – Pilot study to aid development of a protocol for a multinational study” with Silvana Henschke – presenting her results for: “Medication-induced delirium: A quantitative analysis of the WHO pharmacovigilance database. We are very proud of their professional presentations, well done!
Lastly you can find our publications that have been accepted over the summer months here:
- Brincat, A., Tonna, A., Vella Bonanno, P., Stewart, D., Weidmann, AE. Colorectal cancer patients’ experiences with antineoplastic agents from the perspective of their significant others: A longitudinal qualitative study. Int J Clin Pharm (2025). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11096-025-01976-2
- Tadic, I., Weidmann AE. Anticholinergic medicines - medication management, prescribing cascades, and deprescribing. International Journal of Clinical Pharmacy, 2025. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11096-025-01965-5.
- Weidmann A.E., Matthíasdóttir R, Proppé GB, Tadić I, Gunnarsson PS, Jónsdóttir F. Medication Causes and Treatment of Delirium in Patients With and Without Dementia. Brain Behav. 2025 Jul;15(7):e70706. https://doi.org/10.1002/brb3.70706.
- Tadic, I., Fialová, D., Hazen, A.,et al. (2025). Current Practices on Prescribing and Deprescribing for Patients on Long-Term Antibiotic Treatment for Chronic Pulmonary Conditions: An Umbrella Review by the European Society of Clinical Pharmacy (ESCP). COPD: Journal of Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease, 22(1). https://doi.org/10.1080/15412555.2025.2532076
JUL 2025
Juli is one final busy month before we are all heading into our summer break. I am pleased to say that we have plenty of successes to celebrate.
First off there was the graduation ceremony of one of our external PhD Students, Dr. Dorothee Michel from Hamburg. She completed her PhD entitled: Implementation of medication reviews in German community pharmacies. Many thanks to my wonderful colleagues Dr. Antonella Tonna and Dr. Dorothee Dartsch, it was a pleasure working with you on this.
Our team here in Innsbruck took a day out from University city life to head to the University centre in Obergurgel for a day of intense discussion about the new curriculum and the team itself. There was even time for a technical Teambuilding challenge.
Most notably we were awarded an AURORA Alliance Exploratory and Collaborative Research grant which is co-funded by the European Union Horizon project. Together with Prof. Dr. Freyja Jónsdóttir (Univeristy of Iceland), Dr. rer. medic. Janine Biermann-Stallwitz (University Duisburg-Essen), Prof. Dr. Carmel Hughes (Queens Univeristy Belfast), Dr. Ivana Tadić (Univeristy of Innsbruck) and Med.Dr. Adalsteinn Gudmundsson (Landspitali Univeristy Hospital, Iceland) we will be aiming to develop focus groups studies to aid in the development of “Actionable prescribing protocols for medication risk associated with delirium in Dementia (AppMedDD)” and look forward to a very productive research collaboration.
The department has had three more papers accepted. Visit the "Listen to our research" section for an audio overview.
- Weidmann A.E., Matthíasdóttir R, Proppé GB, Tadić I, Gunnarsson PS, Jónsdóttir F. Medication Causes and Treatment of Delirium in Patients With and Without Dementia. Brain Behav. 2025 Jul;15(7):e70706. https://doi.org/10.1002/brb3.70706.
- Weidmann, A.E., Cadogan, C., Fialová, D. et al. Behavioural theories, models and frameworks to underpin clinical pharmacy and pharmacy practice research: guidance from the European Society of Clinical Pharmacy. Int J Clin Pharm (2025). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11096-025-01966-4
Finally, we congratulate our very own Mrs. Mag. Jasmin Stoll who successfully submitted her PhD thesis entitled “Development and extension of the interdisciplinary role profile of hospital pharmacists in Austria”. We wish her well for her assessment and her viva later in the year.
We are now signing off for a few weeks to enjoy a much-needed break. We will be back in September with more news of activities and achievements of the clinical pharmacy team.
JUN 2025
This month saw a mix of emotions.
Another two of our papers have been accepted, entitled "Anticholinergic medicines – medication management, prescribing cascades, and deprescribing" & “Behavioural theories, models and frameworks to underpin clinical pharmacy and pharmacy practice research: Guidance from the European Society of Clinical Pharmacy" and we will post the links once they are available.
We had a wonderful time at the second Zukunft Pharmazie event which saw research presentations from all PhD and some Masters students in the Faculty of Pharmacy. I am extremely proud of our entire team (see photo1); Ivana, Jasmin, Danielle, Aqeel as well as our Master students Silvana and Claudia and the wonderful research work they presented. It was really insightful, and it was wonderful to see the progress made by everyone over the past year.
We were also lucky to have been asked to contribute a talk on “Academic writing and AI” at the European Calcium Channel Conference in Alpbach and to the further education series of the Institute for Technical Chemistry and Environmental Chemistry at the Friedrich-Schiller-University Jena.
A trip to the Karl-Franzens Univeristy, Graz to develop a class on “Klinische Pharmazie” which saw lots of interesting students discussions and a very entertaining communication workshop. It also included a wonderful re-union with one of our very own Masterstudents, Julia Schintler, who is completing her Pre-registration year in Graz. We are looking forward to your return to Innsbruck next year Julia.
It is very hard to comprehend the tragedy that had unfolded in Graz only a day earlier and our sincere thoughts are with all families, friends and relatives affected by this senseless tragedy.
The month was rounded off with the attendance at the Sommersymposium Arzneimittetherpiesicherheit (AMTS) hosted by the Doktoralprogram for Clinical Pharmacy at the LMU Klinik München (https://www.promo-klinische-pharmazie.med.uni-muenchen.de/index.html). Talks by several of their PhD students impressively showed the range of clinical pharmacy research which is ongoing as part of this interdisciplinary programme at the clinic. This research is generating much-needed evidence of the benefit of involving a clinical pharmacist in direct patient care and the range of tools that can be used and optimised effectively to improve patient safety in the German-speaking healthcare systems of Central Europe. We are delighted to start our research collaboration off with a joint UIBK master's student project investigating the relationship between anticholinergic exposure and delirium in a retrospective cohort of cardiovascular surgery patients. Thank you to our collaborators from LMU Dr rer. nat. Maximilian Günther, Dr Dorothea Strobch and Dr Caroline Geßele. We very much look forward to working with you.
MAY 2025
May was filled with lots of focus, concentration, and the hustle and bustle of a packed full semester. Nevertheless, two highlights included the delivery of a fun workshop on “AI in academic writing and research" which I had the pleasure of delivering to approx. 60 scientists and early career researchers at the European Calcium Channel Conference 2025 (https://calciumchannel.eu) located in the beautiful Alpbachtal.
We also wish to extend a huge congratulation to both our wonderful ERASMUS students Johanna and Kristin who successfully defended their Master’s thesis at the University of Iceland and are now fully fledged pharmacists. The results of both projects will be presented at international conferences: the European Geriatric Medicine Society (EuGMS) in September 2025 and the European Delirium Association Conference (EDA) in November 2025. We are so proud to have been part of your journey, and we hope you’ll come back to visit us soon.
AWARD ANNOUNCEMENT: Springer Nature Editor of Distinction Award 2025
Univ.-Prof. Dr. Anita Weidmann has received a Springer Nature Editor of Distinction Award 2025 for her contributions to the International Journal of Clinical Pharmacy as an Associate Editor.
This award recognises her meticulous assessment of submissions and rigorous management of the peer review process, safeguarding the scientific accuracy of the published record.
We are proud to do our bit to uphold the highest standards of academic research and academic integrity within the field of clinical and pharmacy practice.
APR 2025
Despite the two-week student break we had another busy month as a team. We had a total of four papers published:
- Weidmann, A.E., Jónsdóttir, F. Deutsche Apothekerausbildung im internationalen Vergleich. Bundesgesundheitsbl (2025). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00103-025-04039-z
- Spagl, K.T., Watson, E.W., Jatowt, A. et al. Evaluating a customised large language model (DELSTAR) and its ability to address medication-related questions associated with delirium: a quantitative exploratory study. Int J Clin Pharm (2025). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11096-025-01900-8
- Tadić I, Schintler J, Weidmann AE, 2024. Implications of a pharmacy students' involvement in collecting the best possible medication histories in hospital settings: a scoping review. American Journal of Health-System Pharmacy https://doi.org/10.1093/ajhp/zxaf101
- Stoll, J., Weidmann A.E. Neuer klinisch-pharamzeutiscjer Kompetenzrahmen. Österreichische Apothekerzeitung (2025), 09(25): 2-4. Download PDF (3 MB)
Huge congratulations to the entire team.
A trip to the beautiful Egmond aan Zee, for the European Society of Clinical Pharmacy Spring Workshop (7.-9.April), saw Anita and Freyja (Jónsdóttir from the University of Iceland) deliver two workshops and a Keynote lecture on how to set the national groundwork to pave the way for prescribing rights for pharamcists (Pictures below). This gave us the opportunity to present our i-UTtER Framework which was developed by us (publication in progress). We were delighted to see that it resonated with many colleagues from all over Europe and Canada, with it’s application being suggested to go beyond prescribing rights but all pharmacy role profile expansion ambitions.
A huge congratulation also goes to our wonderful ERASMUS students Kristín Brynjarsdóttir & Johanna Lan who submitted their Masters thesis on time and in superb quality. Their works entitled:
- Medication-Induced Delirium in Children: A systematic review
- Use of Antipsychotics in Delirium: A pilot study to aid development of a protocol for a multinational study
Are very important to fulfil the Departments mission to develop a consensus guideline on medication associated risk with the causation, prevention and treatment of delirium in all patient groups. We look forward to presenting these results at the EUGMS and EDA conferences. Sadly it also meant we had to say goodbye to these wonderful students who had to travel back to Iceland for the viva. We will miss you, thanks for bringing so much fun and joy to our department. Sadly, this months discussion evening had to be postponed to May. Here is hoping for a big turnout in May. Download PDF (140 KB)
PARTNER ANNOUNCEMENT: Young Scientist of the Year 2025 for Iceland
In further news, we are very proud to announce that our close collaborative partner, Assoc. Prof. Dr. Freyja Jónsdóttir, has been chosen as the Young Scientist of the Year 2025 for Iceland. Over the past decade, Freyja, a clinical pharmacist at Landspitali Hospital and a lecturer at the University of Iceland, has led the development of the postgraduate training programme for clinical pharmacists in Iceland in close collaboration with University College London and the Royal Pharmaceutical Society of Great Britain. This training programme has completely transformed the landscape for clinical hospital pharmacists in Iceland.
Together with Freyja we have set up a very successful interdisciplinary research team that specialises in identifying medication-associated risks for the causation, treatment and prevention of delirium in all patient groups with the ultimate goal of developing clinical practice guidelines to support clinicians and improve patient safety. We have jointly supervised many master's and PhD students over the years who have worked as part of our delirium team.
Well done, Freyja. Huge congratulations from us all. A very well-deserved honour for such an inspirational powerhouse of clinical pharmacy and a wonderful colleague and friend.
Here are the links:
MAR 2025
As we welcome the start of a new semester, we have a few more milestones to celebrate within the team. Our wonderful PhD Student Aqeel Aslam from Pakistan celebrated his 1st year at the department. Aqeel is working in medication risks associated with delirium superimposed on dementia and has achieved a lot on his first year with us. Highlights include the completion of his systematic literature review, submission of his first results Abstract to the European Geriatric Medicine Congress (review still ongoing), his first oral presentation of his research to the Tirol Klinken and the attendance of the European Delirium Conference in The Hague. The quality of his work is supported by him being awarded one of the competitive UIBK Student scholarships. We wish you the very best for the next year of research, Aqeel [see Photo 01].
Speaking of great PhD student achievements , our very own Danielle has been awarded the 4th poster prize at the Annual Austrian Pharmacy conference entitled “Identification, Priotisation and Resolution: Challenges and strategies in dealing with medication related problems in community pharmacies – a focus group study”. Well done; this is such an important piece of work trying to enable better resolution of medication related problems and communication between pharmacists and GPs to optimise patient safety [see Photo 02].
Our Master student Alumni Mag.pharm. Katharina Spagl has also had her paper accepted, which resulted from her excellent Masters project. The work entitled “Evaluating a Customised Large Language Model (DELSTAR) and its Ability to Address Medication-related Questions Associated with Delirium: A Quantitative Exploratory Study.” The work focused on optimising our department's large language model which is designed to answer questions around medication risks associated with delirium in different patient populations. The paper will be published in the special issue of the international Journal of Clinical Pharmacy “AI and related Innovative Technologies in Clinical Pharmacy Practice and Research”. Once published you will find it under the following DOI-Link: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11096-025-01900-8
February also saw the publication of several more papers:
Our PhD student Danielle, published her very first paper – congratulations! The aim of the scoping review was to examine the approaches to identifying, classifying, and documenting DRPs in community pharmacies in Europe, and their associated barriers and facilitators. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11096-024-01834-7
Next up was the publication from one of our excellent Masters students projects. Teresa interviewed nurses at the Barmherzige Brüder hospital in Linz with the aim to determine their attitudes towards the unit dose dispensing system implemented by the hospital pharmacy department and explore their experiences with its implementation. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rcsop.2025.100566
Lastly we are delighted that the first of a series of papers looking at the role of medication risk in the development and treatment of delirium in different patient groups. The work was done in collaboration with the University of Iceland. Gudny Björk Proppe an ERASMUS+ student from Iceland conducted this work while on her 6 month mobility scholarship at our department here at UIBK https://doi.org/10.1007/s11096-024-01861-4
FEB 2025
February saw the world of clinical and pharmacy practice descend on Innsbruck as we successfully hosted the 14th Pharmaceutical Care Network Europe (PCNE) Conference.
120 researchers and colleagues from Australia to Ireland took part in a 3.5-day event from 5th – 8th February. In addition to 12 hours of workshops on five different topics from quality indicators to design thinking, attendants were treated to plenary lectures on a diverse range of topics: Pharmacogenomics in Medication reviews [Prof. Dr. Kurt E. Hersberger & Anna Bollinger, The University of Basel, Switzerland]; Application of behavioural theories, models and frameworks in pharmacy practice research [Prof. Dr. Anita Elaine Weidmann, The Innsbruck University, Austria]; Challenges and opportunities of introducing AI-enabled solutions in pharmaceutical care and research [Assoc. Prof. Kreshnik Hoti, University of Prishtina, Republic of Kosovo] and Evaluation of medication management reviews: are they effective in optimising pharmaceutical care? [Prof Timothy F. Chen, The University of Sydney]. This is the first time ever that the Pharmaceutical Care Network Europe (PCNE) Conference was held in Austria, and we are grateful to our main sponsor the Austrian Chamber of Pharmacists for their support to allow this to take place at Innsbruck University. We were proud to have hosted PCNE at this university.
JAN 2025
The new year kicked off with a very productive visit of our wonderful collaborator Ass. Prof. Dr. Freyja Jónsdóttir from the University of Iceland. Aside from visiting her students Krísín Brynjarsdóttir and Jóhanna Lan who are working with us on an ERASMUS+ scholarship until May, we worked on the progression of several joint collaborative research projects.
January also saw the publication of a statement paper by the The International Collaboration of Pharmacy Journal Editors (ICPJE) [1]. This international group of colleagues is dedicated toward strengthening clinical, social and administrative pharmacy practice, not only as a discipline, but the entire profession, including the patients served by its clinicians and researchers. We are very proud to be part of this group.
At the end of January, we contributed to the new interdisciplinary Pg MSc in Medication Therapy Safety. A joint project of different Universities in Germany. Prof. Weidmann delivered a teaching session on “Success and barriers to service implementation in clinical practice.” What a great opportunity to help educate the large range of healthcare professionals on keeping patients safe.
[1] Alves da Costa, F., Fernandez-Llimos, F., Desselle, S. et al. The International Collaboration of Pharmacy Journal Editors (ICPJE) formally constituted to foster quality around clinical and social pharmacy practice research publications*. Int J Clin Pharm 47, 4–7 (2025). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11096-024-01833-8