Background: Drug therapy is a major component of patient care management in health care settings. Irrational and inappropriate use of drugs in health care system observed globally is being a major concern. In the field of ophthalmology, there have been many drug developments and different classes of drugs with combinational products are available in ophthalmology for the treatment of ophthalmic diseases. Periodic prescription analysis in the form of drug utilization study can improve the quality of prescription and curb the menace of irrational prescribing. Aim and objectives were to study the prescribing pattern and drug utilization trends in Ophthalmology outpatient department at a tertiary care hospital in Navi Mumbai.Methods: A cross-sectional, observational study was conducted over a period of six months in Ophthalmology department of a tertiary care teaching hospital, Navi-Mumbai. A total of 103 adult patients visiting Ophthalmology OPD for curative symptoms were included and their prescriptions were analyzed with WHO prescribing indicators and additional indices.Results: Analysis showed that the average number of drugs per prescription was 1.9. Percentage of drugs prescribed by brand was 100 % versus generic 0 %. Percentage of drugs prescribed from National Essential drug list (NEDL) was 53%. The percentage of encounters with antibiotics was 30.6%. The commonest prescribed drugs were ocular lubricants followed by antibiotics. Eye drops were the commonest prescribed dosage form.Conclusions: Ocular lubricants and antibiotics dominated the prescribing pattern in this study with restraint on polypharmacy, but showed ample scope for improvement in encouraging the ophthalmologist to prescribe generic and selection of essential drugs.

Background: A well-made research is a cumbersome process. The submission of a research article for publication is the final stage of long planning, execution, analysis, and final preparation of the research document. Concerns have been raised about the gradual decline of ethical principles that guide scientific research as well as writing and publication. Postgraduate residents (PG) are in their interim phase of education, research and practice. MCI guidelines has made mandatory for PG's to pursue research as a part of academic requirement. There exists paucity in literature on the ethical aspects of publication among PG residents. To assess the level of understanding of PG residents with respect to the ethical norms of paper publication. Methodology: A cross-sectional, observational questionnaire survey was conducted among PG's pursuing education at a tertiary care teaching hospital, Navi-Mumbai. A total of 60 PG's were included. The questionnaire included aspects of ethics, authorship, conflict of interest, plagiarism, simultaneous submission and salami slicing. Result: Majority of the PG residents were involved in research and published research paper. Majority (83.33%) followed ICMR guidelines for publication. The correct criteria for authorship were known to only 5%. A large fraction knew what conflict of interest (68.3%) and plagiarism (86.6) meant. The terms simultaneous publication (35%), duplicate publication (31.6%) and salami slicing (26.6%) were poorly known. Conclusion: The overall ethical understanding of PG residents with respect to paper publication was low. Further, structured CME/workshop on ethics and paper publications need to be planned to reduce the knowledge gap.