Objectives
In Jordan, drive‐thru pharmacy service has recently been introduced representing a new trend in community pharmacy services. This study aimed to evaluate pharmacy customers' awareness and perceptions towards the drive‐thru service to unveil important information regarding such service.
Methods
A Self‐administered questionnaire was used in this cross‐sectional study which was conducted in Amman‐Jordan between April and August 2017. A Self‐administered questionnaire was used to evaluate pharmacy customers' awareness and perceptions towards pharmacy drive‐thru services. Factors affecting customers' use of this service was also investigated.
Key findings
A total of 789 pharmacy customers participated in the current study. Mean age of study participants was 27.7 years (SD = 10.6) and half of them were men (n = 397, 50.4%). Although 26.8% (n = 212) of the customers knew that the drive‐thru pharmacy service was newly implemented in Jordanian pharmacies, only 10.9% (n = 86) reported to have used this service. Customers (59.1%) expressed their support for the introduction of this service to pharmacy practice in the country. Certain factors affected customers' use of the drive‐thru pharmacy service positively, including male gender, Jordanian nationality, non‐single marital status and having children (P‐value <0.05).
Conclusions
This study demonstrated positive customer awareness and perceptions towards the drive‐thru pharmacy service. Busy customers seem to use this service more (men being married and having children). Hence, this service seems to be most beneficial to a certain type of customers. However, concerns about poor communication between the pharmacist and the patient represented the main disadvantage of the drive‐thru service.