Assessing the Travel Health Knowledge of Australian Pharmacists.

Ian M Heslop,Michelle Bellingan,Beverley D Glass,Richard Speare

doi:10.3390/pharmacy8020094

Ian M Heslop, Michelle Bellingan + Show 2 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.3390/pharmacy8020094

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Abstract

Worldwide, the numbers of travellers are increasing, with pharmacists having the potential to play a significant role in the provision of pre-travel health services to a large number of these travellers. However, studies examining whether pharmacists have the travel health knowledge to provide these services are limited. This study thus aimed to explore the travel health knowledge of Australian pharmacists. Surveys assessing pharmacists’ knowledge of travel health were distributed through the Pharmaceutical Society of Australia and community pharmacies for self-completion. Overall, the travel health knowledge of participants was found to be good. However, although the majority of participants were aware of the common causes of morbidity and mortality in travel health, some slightly overestimated the prevalence of malaria and were less knowledgeable about the global distribution of some diseases. Most participants also demonstrated an ability to give appropriate advice on the management of traveller’s diarhoea, the selection of appropriate items for inclusion in travel first aid kits, vaccinations, and malarial chemoprophylaxis for travellers visiting endemic areas. This study highlights that Australian pharmacists have the knowledge to deliver travel health advice, with the potential to improve both access and outcomes for travellers.

Highlights

Many travellers do not seek pre-travel health advice before travelling overseas, and those who do mainly obtain advice from general practitioners (GP) or travel health clinics [1,2,3,4,5]
69% of participants stated that they provided travel-related health advice or services. For the majority, their travel health workload was low with 70% of participants advising less than 2 travellers per week and 83% spending less than one hour per week providing travel health advice
This study examined the travel health knowledge of a sample of Australian pharmacists and, as with comparable studies, some knowledge gaps were identified

Summary

Introduction

Many travellers do not seek pre-travel health advice before travelling overseas, and those who do mainly obtain advice from general practitioners (GP) or travel health clinics [1,2,3,4,5]. Reasons given for failing to obtain pre-travel health advice include the travellers’ lack of perception of the risks associated with their destination or difficulties in making appointments with travel health providers [6,7,8,9]. Pharmacists are often seen as being accessible and convenient due to their extensive opening hours, offering an attractive alternative to increase the frequency and quality of pre-travel advice sought by some travellers [6,7,8,9]. Pharmacists do play a significant role in the provision of travel health services, the complexity of the travel health services offered by pharmacists varies somewhat from country to country and region to region [9,10]. Pharmacists are generally considered to have good knowledge on commonly encountered areas in travel health, such as travellers’ diarrhoea [11], it has been suggested that generalist

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