Assessment of drug use patterns in terms of the WHO patient-care and facility indicators at four hospitals in Southern Ethiopia: a cross-sectional study

Abstract

BackgroundPatient-centered care is now the goal for virtually all healthcare systems. The aim of this research was to evaluate the patient care quality in regard to drug dispensing in four hospitals in southern Ethiopia namely Wolaita Sodo University teaching and referral hospital (WSUTRH), Tercha zonal hospital (TZH), Sodo Christian hospital (SCH) and Dubo St. Mary’s Catholic primary hospital (DSMCPH).MethodsA cross sectional study was conducted by using the WHO patient care and facility indicators between September 10 and October 20, 2014. Patients who visited the outpatient departments of the four hospitals were selected by systematic random sampling method and interviewed. In total 384 patients were selected based on a rough estimate of proportion of patients visiting to the four hospitals. Facility indicators including the availability of essential drugs list (EDL), national drug formulary, standard treatment guideline (STG) and key drugs were evaluated. Descriptive statistical calculations were performed using SPSS® version 20.0 software.ResultThe mean number of drugs was in the range between 1.9 ± 0.9 to 2.2 ± 2.0. The mean consultation time range was found to be 4.2 ± 1.6 to 4.9 ± 5.0 min whereas the mean dispensing time was ranged from 96.1 ± 52.0 to 152.3 ± 47.6 s. The overall mean number of drug prescribed for the four hospitals was 2.0 ± 1.2 and the mean percentage of medications actually dispensed in the hospitals was thus calculated to be 86.3. The mean percentage of medications clearly labeled was 45.4. Patients who knew their dosage forms accurately were 78.8. Among the four hospitals evaluated only one hospital (25 %) had at least a copy of the Ethiopian essential drug list (EDL), standard treatment guideline for hospitals and drug formulary. The mean availability of key drugs in the hospitals was found to be 65.7 %.ConclusionThe result of the present study indicates that the patient consulting time, medications labeling and availability of key drugs in the hospitals are inadequate. The medication labeling practice in the four hospitals is unacceptably low. These patient care indicators need a special attention for improvement.Electronic supplementary materialThe online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s12913-016-1882-8) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

Drug Prescribing and Dispensing Practices in Tertiary Care Hospital of Eastern Ethiopia: Evaluation with World Health Organization Core Prescribing and Patient Care Indicators

“…The percentage of patient knowledge on this study was found to be 61.88%. This value is lower than other studies such as 70% in Zimbabwe [39] and 78.8% in southern Ethiopia [36]. The patient knowledge may fade further when the time goes on as expected from the quality of dispensing.…”

“…The percentage of dispensed drugs was found similar with the average percent values of four hospitals in southern Ethiopia (86.3%). However, the percentage of labeled drugs in this study was much lower than the aforementioned setting (45.4%) [36]. The availability of essential drugs in the dispensary of healthcare settings is one indicator for quality of care.…”

“…Moreover, longer dispensing time was reported in different settings. For example, 96.1 s (±52.0) to 152.3 s (±47.6) in four hospitals of southern Ethiopia [36], 105 s in average of ten countries [37,38], 150 s in Zimbabwe [39] and 201 s in Nigerian healthcare settings [40]. The duration of dispensing time ultimately affects the level of comprehension of patients towards the course of treatment.…”

Evaluation of Drug Use Pattern in Emergency Department of Dilchora Referral Hospital, Dire Dawa, Ethiopia

“…is finding was better than the study conducted in Ethiopia at selected health facilities where only one out of the four hospitals had a copy of the EDL, national drug formulary, and STG during the evaluation period, which makes the overall availability 25% [7]. e mean availability of essential key drugs was 64% in this study, which was comparable (65.7%) with a study conducted in four hospitals of South Ethiopia [25].…”

Prescribing practices using WHO prescribing indicators and factors associated with antibiotic prescribing in six community pharmacies in Asmara, Eritrea: a cross-sectional study

“…These set of indicators could be used as benchmarks to enable the introduction of antibiotic stewardship programs (ASPs) in different healthcare settings [2,3,15]. Many studies have reported using the WHO indicators [17][18][19][20][21][22][23][24][25]. Studying prescribing patterns of medicines in general and antibiotic in particular aids in identifying irrational prescribing behaviors to make therapy more rational and cost effective [26].…”