ABSTRACT
This study aimed to measure the performance of primary health care centres in Eastern province, Saudi Arabia, using the WHO/International Network of Rational Use of Drugs patient care and facility-specific drug use indicators. In a cross-sectional study, 10 health centres were selected using systematic random sampling. A total of 300 patients were interviewed while visiting the centre from January to March 2011 and 10 pharmacists from the same centres were interviewed. Average consultation time was 7.3 min [optimal >/-30 min], percentage of drugs adequately labelled was 10% [optimal 100%] and patient's knowledge of correct dosage was 79.3% [optimal 100%]. The percentage of key drugs in stock was only 59.2% [optimal 100%]. An overall index of rational facility-specific drug use was calculated and applied to rank the health centres for benchmarking