 |
Research Articles
Self-medication needs and practice of community pharmacies in Duhok
1 Head of Scientific Research Division, Directorate General of Health, Duhok, Iraq
2 Professor of Clinical Epidemiology, College of Medicine, University of Duhok, Iraq
Address correspondence to:
Wjam Sadic Al Hassan
Head of Scientific Research Division, Directorate General of Health, Duhok,
Iraq
Message to Corresponding Author
Article ID: 100023P16WH2019
Access full text article on other devices
Access PDF of article on other devices
How to cite this article
Al Hassan WS, Al Habeeb QS. Self-medication needs and practice of community pharmacies in Duhok. Edorium J Public Health 2019;6:100023P16WH2019.ABSTRACT
Aims: Self-medication is a common practice in most populations with all its drawbacks and problems. The study aimed to assess the professional performance of the staff of community pharmacies in this respect.
Methods: A cross-sectional design using a simulated client methodology was adopted to investigate the professional performance of pharmacists and/or assistants in the management of selfmedication needs provided by 53 community pharmacies in Duhok city. The study was implemented during the period from August 2016 to February 2017. The performance of the responsible pharmacist and/or the assistant in each community pharmacy was assessed through six case scenarios. During the act of each scenario, three practice domains were assessed including communications skills, problem analysis, and advice. The assessment is done by two simulated clients: male and female. A specially designed questionnaire was used for scoring performance. Data were analyzed using Stata version 14. Chi square test was used to test the association between research variables.
Results: The overall mean score of performance in the three practice domains amounted to 35.1% of the presumed ideal score. Differentially, the best performance score was in communication skills followed by advice and problem analysis (65.6, 28.7, and 11% of the ideal score respectively). Statistically the differences were highly significant, p-value <0.001.
Conclusion: The overall score of professional performance was around one third of the presumed ideal practice. Rapid and effective corrective measures need to be put in action to overcome such an unacceptable practice defect.
Keywords: Advice, Community pharmacies, Communication skills, Problem analysis, Self-medication
SUPPORTING INFORMATION
Acknowledgments
Thanks to the Directorate General of Health in Duhok to give the permission to do this research. We also would like to thank the simulated clients for their commitment for the whole period of the study. Thanks are also due to Dr. Saad Younis for his help in statistical analysis.
Author ContributionsWjam Sadic Al Hassan - Substantial contributions to conception and design, Acquisition of data, Analysis of data, Interpretation of data, Drafting the article, Revising it critically for important intellectual content, Final approval of the version to be published
Qayser Sahib Al Habeeb - Substantial contributions to conception and design, Acquisition of data, Analysis of data, Interpretation of data, Drafting the article, Revising it critically for important intellectual content, Final approval of the version to be published
Guaranter of SubmissionThe corresponding author is the guarantor of submission.
Source of SupportNone
Data AvailabilityAll relevant data are within the paper and its Supporting Information files.
Conflict of InterestAuthors declare no conflict of interest.
Copyright© 2019 Wjam Sadic Al Hassan et al. This article is distributed under the terms of Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricted use, distribution and reproduction in any medium provided the original author(s) and original publisher are properly credited. Please see the copyright policy on the journal website for more information.
