Deprescribing for nursing home residents with limited life expectancy: A qualitative study to identify barriers and enablers for healthcare professionals

Nursing home residents with limited life expectancy often take many medications eligible to deprescribing. Deprescribing is crucial but not yet routinely implemented. Therefore the aim of this study was to explore healthcare professionals (HCPs) barriers to and enablers for deprescribing and to identify theoretical domains for behavior change to be included into future interventions. A qualitative descriptive study using semistructured interviews was conducted among 28 HCPs working in Belgian nursing homes. The data were analysed inductively using thematic analysis followed by mapping barriers and enablers to theoretical domain framework (TDF), and linking the domains to behavioral change techniques (BCTs). We identified multifaceted barriers and enablers across six themes: healthcare system and policy factors, resource- and organization-level factors, professional role and competency factors, interprofessional collaboration and communication factors, attitudes and perceptions towards deprescribing, and triadic dynamics in deprescribing. These barriers and enablers were mapped to 13 of the 14 TDF domains. (c) 2025 Elsevier Inc. All rights are reserved, including those for text and data mining, AI training, and similar technologies.