ABSTRACT
Background: The main objective of this study was to determine and compare current drug-related knowledge and clinical skills in terms of medication error identification among future healthcare professionals. Methods: Study participantswere asked to identify errors in three different prescriptions. Around 15 minutes were given to complete the questionnaire without using any references in a classroom setting. The medication error identificationrate was calculated based on the number of students that have identified the errors correctly.Results: Among 225 respondents, significant differences were found between the three groups,i.e. Prescription 1 p=0.001, Prescription 2 p=0.023, Prescription 3 p=0.024. Pharmacy students had highermedication erroridentification rate compared to medical and nursing students.Conclusion: Final year pharmacy students were found to have the best drug-related knowledge and clinical skills in terms ofmedication error identification
ABSTRACT
Rational application of genomics into practice would lead to safer chemotherapy through individualized medicine. The increasing trends of genetic discoveries coupled with increased adoption of pharmacogenomics in developed countries pose challenges to the presence and future healthcare professionals, not only in Malaysia. This research, aimed to assess knowledge, attitude and practice of final-year future healthcare professionals towards pharmacogenomics. A cross-sectional study was conducted by administering self-completed questionnaire (Reliability 0.82) to 247 participants, among which 68.4% responded. More than half were female medical students. The mean knowledge scores in percentage were 57.57±20.2 with a significant difference between the two groups (p = 0.002). Positive attitude, but low practice were observed which differs between pharmacy and medical students, p<0.05. Association between knowledge, attitude and practice, were investigated. The majority has demonstrated good knowledge and attitude towards pharmacogenomics, but with low practice. Studies are required to large sample and to examine barriers to adoption of pharmacogenomics.