Thai physicians’ perceptions of sources of information about new drugs in terms of amounts of information and trustworthiness.

ABSTRACT

Objective: To determine Thai physicians’ opinions of sources of information about new drugs regarding amounts of information and the trustworthiness of the sources. Methods: Questionnaires developed by the research team were sent to physicians working at each regional/general hospital (92 totals) of the Ministry of Public Health in Thailand asking them to indicate the amount of information about new drugs from different sources and the trustworthiness of the sources. Multiple regression analysis was used to determine variables that related to the trustworthiness of information sources. Results: One hundred and thirty (28.26%) of 460 questionnaires were returned. These indicated that in terms of amounts of new information, Thai physicians received most from academic conferences, followed by medical journals, and medical representatives respectively. Information from conferences was considered to be most trustworthy followed by information from medical schools and experts. In contrast, information from medical representatives, direct mail advertisements, and hospital pharmacists had low trustworthiness. After controlling for the variables of gender, education, and type of hospital, multiple regression analysis found that the only significant factor was the relationship between age and trustworthiness of information from the source of medical journals (standardized β = 0.199, p = 0.039). There was no factor that significantly related to trustworthiness of information from other sources. Conclusion: Thai physicians received information about new drugs from both commercial and professional sources but trusted information from the latter more. This was considered appropriate as studies had found that information from commercial sources was sometimes inaccurate, incomplete and misleading.