PurposeThis study assessed the incidence and types of medication errors, interventions and outcomes in patients on antiretroviral therapy (ART) in selected HIV treatment centres in Nigeria.MethodsOf 69 health facilities that had program for active screening of medication errors, 14 were randomly selected for prospective cohort assessment. All patients who filled/refilled their antiretroviral medications between February 2009 and March 2011 were screened for medication errors using study-specific pharmaceutical care daily worksheet (PCDW). All potential or actual medication errors identified, interventions provided and the outcomes were documented in the PCDW. Interventions included pharmaceutical care in HIV training for pharmacists amongst others. Chi-square was used for inferential statistics and P<0.05 indicated statistical significance.ResultsOf 6,882 participants, 67.0% were female and 93.5% were aged ≥15years old. The participants had 110,070 medications filling/refilling visits, average (±SD) of 16.0 (±0.3) visits per patient over the observation period. Patients were followed up for 9172.5 person-years. The number of drug items dispensed to participants was 305,584, average of 2.8 (±0.1) drug items per patient. The incidence rate of medication errors was 40.5 per 100 person-years. The occurrence of medication errors was not associated with participants’ sex and age (P>0.05). The major medications errors identified were 26.4% incorrect ART regimens prescribed; 19.8% potential drug-drug interaction or contraindication present; and 16.6% duration and/or frequency of medication inappropriate. Interventions provided included 67.1% cases of prescriber contacted to clarify/resolve errors and 14.7% cases of patient counselling and education; 97.4% of potential/actual medication error(s) were resolved.ConclusionThe incidence rate of medication errors was somewhat high; and majority of identified errors were related to prescription of incorrect ART regimens and potential drug-drug interactions; the prescriber was contacted and the errors were resolved in majority of cases. Active screening for medication errors is feasible in resource-limited settings following a capacity building intervention.

Background:In most communities, the first level of healthcare visit is usually the community pharmacies hence, has the chance to detect HIV for the provision of early intervention for HIV services. Consequently, if access to HIV care, treatment and prevention services is enhanced at the level of community pharmacies, the burden of HIV/AIDS in Nigeria will be reduced significantly.Purpose: The study assessed the knowledge of community pharmacists regarding HIV/AIDS and its management and their level of standard precautions practice.Methods: Out of 242 community pharmacists in Abuja Municipal Area Council (AMAC), Federal Capital Territory, a total of 155 registered community pharmacists who had valid practicing license were randomly selected. A questionnaire specifically designed for this study was self-administered to these participants. SPSS was used for the analysis, a P-value of less than 0.05 was regarded as significant and Chi-square tests were applied for inferential analysis.Results: Within the 155 community pharmacists sampled, complete response were obtained from 104 (67%) community pharmacists. The mean age of the participants was 44.3 years (SD ± 2.47). There were 72.1% males. 80.8% of the participants had only Bachelor of Pharmacy degree, 79.8% of participants reported correctly that HIV can be transmitted through with blood and semen and this was significantly associated with level of education (p = 0.002). Most of the participants (92.3%) did not know the HIV transmission rate from mother to child in the deficiency of antiretroviral drugs in developing countries and only 37.8% of community pharmacists keep stock of antiretroviral drugs for post exposure prophylaxis. Many of the participants (83.0%) had good knowledge of the concept of standard precaution and 76.0% knew the conditions of which standard precautions should be practiced. 57.5% of the participants wash their hands with soap and water always after any direct contact with patients, 63.2% recap used needles after giving injections or drawing blood from the patients. Only 26.9% had been vaccinated against Hepatitis B. Conclusion:The finding of this study revealed that the knowledge and practice of community pharmacists in HIV/AIDS is relatively poor especially mother-to-child transmission. In as much as the knowledge of community pharmacists on standard precaution was good, there were paucities in their practice of standard precaution especially in the area of handling and disposal of used needles, poor availability of HIV post exposure prophylaxis drugs and vaccination against Hepatitis B. Management of HIV/AIDS should be integrated into the curriculum for continuing professional development for pharmacists. The implementation of adherence to the principles of standard precaution through consistent monitoring and supervision is highly recommended.

As the pandemic was sudden and no time was given to prepare for the lockdown measure, pharmaceutical practices were significantly disrupted in the aspects of manufacturing and supplying drugs, sales, and profit-making. Therefore, this study assessed the impacts of COVID-19 crisis on pharmaceutical practices in Nigeria. A descriptive cross-sectional design survey was adopted to draw information from the pharmacists (respondents) among the targeted population. 1,200 professional and practice pharmacists were systematically and randomly selected across the six geopolitical zones in Nigeria, while 1,118 copies of the administered questionnaire were retrieved, coded, and analyzed using descriptive and inferential statistics aided by the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) software version 23 to run the analyses. The findings showed that COVID-19 had negative impacts on pharmaceutical practices, especially in hospital and community practices. A 25%-49% decrease was highly indicated in sales, purchase orders, and profits, while the majority, 347 (31.04%) of the respondents, indicated that they had a 1%-24% decrease in their workforce. Also, total lockdown as a COVID-19 measure increased the level of insecurity and inflation during the pandemic. 75.13% of the pharmacists who represent the targeted population indicated that their place of work largely enforced COVID-19 basic preventive measures during the pandemic. This study concludes that necessary efforts should be put in place to ease the affairs of the pharmaceutical practices before, during, and after the pandemic. Keywords: COVID-19, Impact, Lockdown, Pharmaceutical Care, Practices, Nigeria.

Pharmacies are the frontline of the pandemic and critical to maintaining public health. The emergence of COVID-19 brought unprecedented challenges and changes to all nations of the world. In the light of this, this study assessed the challenges of pharmaceutical practices in Nigeria during COVID-19. A descriptive cross-sectional survey design was adopted, and the data were collected from 1,200 respondents through the interview schedule and structured questionnaire using a systematic random sampling technique. A total of 1,118 copies of the questionnaire were retrieved, coded, and analysed using descriptive and inferential statistics aided by the SPSS software version 23. The study discovered different factors that influenced the effective practice of pharmacists during the COVID-19 pandemic. The findings of this study revealed that the majority, 591(52.9%) of the pharmacists, encountered difficulties on the road with security personnel while on essential duty and also found it ‘somewhat difficult to work during the pandemic. The results of Factor Analysis grouped the major challenges into material and financial constraints. The results showed two orthogonal factors pharmaceutical practices, which were derived with the total explanation of 65.35% of the variance. Only variables with constraints loadings of 0.70 and above were used in naming the constraints. The material constraint has the greatest impact on effective practices of pharmacists to provide treatment for illnesses during COVID-19 with a 44.16% contribution. There is a need for government and institution supports for better and effective pharmaceutical practices before, during, and after any sort of pandemic, especially in drugs supplies and financial assistance. Keywords: Assessment, Challenges, COVID-19 Pandemic, Pharmaceutical Practices, Nigeria.