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Evaluation of Knowledge, Attitude and Practice of Community Pharmacist in OTC Drug Dispensing and Counselling
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| Author:
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SAM EBENEZER D, KRISHNA RAVI, SHANMUGA SUNDARAM RAJAGOPAL
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| Abstract:
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Background & Objectives: Over-the-counter (OTC) drugs are medicines that are sold directly to a consumer without a prescription from a healthcare professional. The approach of Pharmaceutical Care is to optimize the patient’s health-related quality of life, and attain positive clinical outcomes, within realistic economic expenditures. The study aimed to evaluate and assess the knowledge, attitude and practice in dispensing and counseling of OTC medications by community pharmacists.
Methods: Prospective observational study was conducted at Community pharmacies in and around Erode for a period of six months. Data were collected by using a self-administered structured questionnaire consist of 50 questions to assess various aspects such as knowledge, attitude and practice of community pharmacist. Correlation between attitude and practice in dispensing and counseling was carried out by Spearman correlation coefficient, Kruskal-Walis test and a p-value <0.05 was considered as statistically significant.
Results: A total of 107 community pharmacist participated in the study. Out of that majority were males 71(66.3%). Analgesics are the class of drugs that have been dispensed more 39(36.4%), followed by antihistamines 37(34.5%), others 13(12.1%) and steroids 6(5.60%).Majority of pharmacists had lack of time 104(97.1%) and high patient load 95(88.7%) as barriersfor providing medication counselling to the patients. In the present study, we observed the statistically significant association between knowledge and attitude (p value=<0.0001).
Interpretation &Conclusions: The present study, there was a significant association between knowledge and attitude for the patient counselling of Over the Counter medication among the study population. Development of continuing education programs for practicing pharmacists to enhance their communication skills and knowledge to improve counselling practices is strongly recommended. In addition, pharmacy laws and regulations need to be re-think to meet the changes in the pharmacy profession from dispensing to a patient focused care. Educational and regulatory interventions are needed which include improving knowledge and professional behaviour of pharmacists and pharmacy assistants.
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| Keyword:
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Community pharmacist, Counselling, OTC, Pharmaceutical care.
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| EOI:
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| DOI:
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https://doi.org/10.31838/ijpr/2021.13.02.398
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| Download:
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