Availability, price, and affordability of medicines used for the management of Covid-19 in health facilities of Dessie town WHO/HAI survey.

BACKGROUND: The rapidly spreading nature of Covid-19 virus associated with its high mortality and mortality rate is triggering an unprecedented public health crisis. The study assessed the availability, price, and affordability of medicines used in the management of Covid-19 in health facilities of Dessie town. METHODS: A retrospective cross-sectional study design was employed in the health facilities of Dessie town from September 1 to September 20, 2021. Data was collected using a standard checklist adopted from the Logistics Indicator Assessment Tool and WHO/HAI. WHO/HAI methodology was applied to select the surveyed health facilities (30) and medicines (44). The daily wage of the lowest-paid unskilled government worker is used to estimate affordability. RESULTS: Fifteen and five medicines were not found at all public and private health facilities, respectively. The originator brand (OB) and lowest price generic (LPG) availability in private health facilities was 2.03% and 51.33%, respectively. In the public sector, the availability of OB and LPG was 0% and 34.44%, respectively. In public and private health facilities, the mean number of stock-outs was 2.25 and 2.91, and the mean number of stock-out days was 177.83 and 106.16 days, respectively. Eight and one LPG medicines were out of stock in public and private health facilities, respectively. Eight (33.33%) and 6 (28.57%) had higher prices than international prices in private and public health facilities, respectively. The median price ratio in public and private health facilities ranged from 0.02 and 3.05 and 0.04 to 2.70, respectively. Eighty percent of the products were unaffordable in both sectors. CONCLUSIONS: The availability of medicines was low. One-third of the medicines had higher prices than international prices. Eighty percent of the products were unaffordable. The regular supply of these medicines is crucial for better management of the disease.

Patient Satisfaction Towards Outpatient Pharmacy Services and Associated Factors at Dessie Town Public Hospitals, South Wollo, North-East Ethiopia.

BACKGROUND: Satisfaction of patients is a key measure of quality pharmacy service delivery. However, the traditional way of drug inventory and dispensing practice by professionals negatively affects the satisfaction of patients. Hence, assessment of satisfaction level is an important tool to identify gaps in pharmacy service delivery and works for its improvement. OBJECTIVE: To determine the level of patients' satisfaction towards outpatient pharmacy service and contributing factors at Dessie Town Public Hospitals, South Wollo, North-east Ethiopia, 2020. METHODS: We implement a facility-based cross-sectional survey on 414 patients over the age of 18 years from the outpatient pharmacy service of Dessie town public hospitals. The study was done from February to June 2020 through a systematic random sampling method and face-to-face pharmacy exit interview using the Self Reporting Questionnaire-17. We used Epi-data version 3.1 for data entry and SPSS-21 software for analysis. We assessed the strength of association in the binary logistic regression with odds ratio and declare statistical significance with p-value <0.05. RESULTS: Among the total patients participated, 246 (59.4%) were satisfied towards outpatient pharmacy services. In this finding, comfortability of waiting area [AOR=1.87; 95% CI, (1.13, 4.18)], frequency of visit [AOR=2.4; 95% CI, (1.19, 4.80)], and payment status [AOR=2.90; 95% CI, (1.21, 6.95)] showed a positive association towards satisfaction. On the other hand, age (28-37 years) [AOR=0.16; 95% CI, (0.08-0.34)], number of drug dispensed [AOR=0.3; 95% CI, 0.13-0.41] and medication availability [AOR=0.44; 95% CI, (0.26, 0.71)] showed a negative association with patient satisfaction. CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS: The findings of the current study revealed that patients' satisfaction towards outpatient pharmacy services provided by public Hospitals at Dessie town was low. Hence, hospitals need to take attention to and consider the identified gaps like improving the availability of drugs, comfortability of waiting area, payment status, and the number of drugs dispensed, and the frequency of visits.

Assessment of Drug Use Pattern Using WHO Core Prescribing Indicators at Outpatient Settings of Governmental Hospitals in Dessie Town.

BACKGROUND: Enhancing the standards of medical treatment at all levels of the healthcare delivery system can improve the quality of life in developing countries. One method to promote rational drug use is an assessment of drug use pattern based on drug use indicators. OBJECTIVE: To evaluate prescription patterns at the outpatient pharmacy of Dessie Referral Hospital and Boru Meda Hospital at Dessie town. METHODS: An institution-based retrospective cross-sectional study was conducted to assess the prescribing patterns in governmental hospitals of Dessie town from April 1 to May 30, 2019. Six hundred eligible prescriptions were selected from each hospital through a systematic random sampling technique. RESULTS: The result of this study showed that both hospitals used standard prescriptions (100%). Age (99.0%) and name (94.7%) of patients were the most commonly recorded patient information while weight, address of patients and diagnosis were recorded only in 1.1%, 39.2% and 61.3% of the studied prescription papers, respectively. A total 2409 drugs were prescribed in the 1200 prescription papers and the percentage of encounters with injection(s) and antibacterial(s) was 9.0% and 42.6%, respectively. At each hospital, all drugs were prescribed from the Ethiopian essential drug list. CONCLUSION: The present study revealed the use of standard presecription papers at both hospitals. None of the patient-related information was completely written in all prescrptions. For drug-related information, only the name of the drug was written in all prescription papers. There is also a significant deviation from the acceptable WHO standard for prescribing antibiotics.