Pharmacist's Practice of Reporting of Adverse Drug Reactions in Saudi Arabia

Objectives: To assess and compare the practice of reporting Adverse Drug Reactions (ADRs) and related factors between community and hospital pharmacists in Saudi Arabia. Methods: This is a cross-sectional study. We used a structured, validated questionnaire to collect the data. A total of 263 pharmacists participated in the survey. The questionnaire captures demographic data of the participants and had 26 questions related to the practice of reporting ADRs and factors that encourage and discourage pharmacists from reporting ADRs. Results: Community pharmacists did not know the location of the ADR form, but hospital pharmacists did know about it, which was significantly different (P<0.05). Despite the increased awareness of ADR form among the hospital pharmacists’, the overall reporting rate was found to be meager among both the group of pharmacists. We found that several reasons led to the low reporting rate of ADR, for example, community pharmacists were unaware of how to report ADR and they considered that the ADR is too trivial to be reported compared to hospital pharmacists (P<0.05). in addition, community pharmacists were not know whom to report the ADRs compared to the hospital pharmacists, which was significantly different (P<0.05). Conclusion: The results of this study demonstrated that pharmacists who work at hospitals had a higher awareness of practicing system of reporting ADRs than that of community pharmacists. Increasing awareness among community pharmacists regarding the pharmacovigilance and ADR reporting systems is highly recommended in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.

Pharmacist's Perception of Pharmacovigilance and Reporting of Adverse Drug Reactions in Saudi Arabia

Background: Pharmacists’ perception toward their role in reporting of Adverse Drug Reactions (ADRs) and their understanding of the importance of reporting ADRs are essential keys to be assessed and studied in order to determine the factors that may predispose to underreporting of ADRs in Saudi Arabia. Therefore, in this study, we aimed to asses and compare the perception of community and hospital pharmacists toward reporting of ADRs in different regions of Saudi Arabia. Method: A structured, validated questionnaire was used to conduct a cross-sectional study. A total of 263 pharmacists were enrolled. The questionnaire included the demographic data of the pharmacists and 11 questions to measure pharmacists’ perceptions of ADRs reporting of reporting ADRs. All statistical analysis done by using Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) version 21 and Survey Monkey system. Result: the result shows that community and hospital pharmacists strongly agree about that reporting of ADRs allow to measure the incidence of ADRs 29 (55.77%), 121 (58.45) and to identify previously unrecognized ADRs 30 (57.69%), 116 (56.59%) and enable safe drugs to be identified 39 (70.91%), 129 (62.32%), respectively with no significant difference (p>0.05). Besides, both hospital pharmacists 116 (55.77%) and community pharmacists 31 (60.78%) strongly agree about their important role in the pharmacovigilance system. However, only 67 (32.52%) of hospital pharmacists strongly agreed about the physician’s responsibility in reporting ADRs compared to community pharmacists 29 (52.73%) with a significant difference between groups (p<0.05). However, 37 (17.87%) of hospital pharmacists were uncertain about drug companies’ role in pharmacovigilance system with a significant difference between community pharmacists with (p<0.05). Conclusion: The result of this study demonstrated that both community and hospital pharmacists among Saudi Arabia had a very goods of perception about the importance of ADRs reporting and their role in reporting ADRs.

Pharmacist's Awareness and Knowledge of Reporting Adverse Drug Reactions in Saudi Arabia

Objectives: Pharmacovigilance is considered a useful tool in detecting, assessing, understanding and preventing Adverse drug reactions (ADRs) to ensure the safety of medications and protect consumers from ADRs. Consequently, the progression and expansion of pharmacovigilance is urgent for safe and effective clinical practice; therefore, in this study, we aimed to compare the awareness and knowledge of the community and hospital pharmacists toward reporting ADRs in different regions of Saudi Arabia. Methods: This cross-sectional study was conducted from January 2016 to March 2016 in Saudi Arabia. A validated and structured questionnaire was distributed by hand or via Internet to 263 hospital and community pharmacists. The questionnaire collected pharmacists’ demographic information and pharmacists’ understanding and knowledge of the pharmacovigilance system and reporting of ADRs. Results: A total of 263 pharmacists responded to the questionnaire with 208 (79.09%) pharmacists from hospital pharmacy sites and 55 (20.91%) pharmacists from community pharmacy responding to the questionnaire. There is a significant difference in the pharmacovigilance concept (p<0.05) between the hospital and community pharmacists. Most community pharmacists were unfamiliar with the existence of a pharmacovigilance center in Saudi Arabia. Furthermore, community pharmacists were unaware of where they could get an ADR reporting form, but hospital pharmacists were aware of this (p<0.05). Conclusion: The results of this study demonstrated that pharmacists who work at hospitals among different regions in Saudi Arabia had a higher awareness of the pharmacovigilance system than that of community pharmacists who worked at the community pharmacy.