Assessment of knowledge, attitude and perception of Pharmacovigilance among nurses in a rural tertiary care center

Abstract

Background: Pharmacovigilance (PV) is an integral and essential part of patient care. PV deals with the science and activities relating to the detection, assessment, understanding, and prevention of adverse effects or any other drug-related problems. The aims of PV are to improve patient care, public health and safety in relation to the use of medicines, to contribute to the assessment of benefit, harm, effectiveness and risk of medicines, encouraging their safe, rational and more effective use, to promote understanding, education and clinical training in PV and its effective communication to health professionals and the public. The objective of present study was to assess the knowledge, attitude and perception of PV among nurses in a rural tertiary care center, Adichunchanagiri Institute of Medical Sciences (AIMS), B G Nagar. Methods: A cross-sectional questionnaire-based study was conducted among nurses of AIMS, B G Nagar, Mandya, Karnataka. Results: A total of 94 respondents were analyzed. 75.53% of participants knew the definition of PV, 77.65% participants knew the international PV reporting centers, 81.91% have knowledge about regulatory body responsible for monitoring adverse drug reactions (ADRs), 80.85% have good orientation of specific ADR format, 98.93% of nurses thought ADR reporting is necessary, 86.13% have attitude of encouraging non-medical persons to report ADR and 95.74% of nurses want PV to be taught in detail and 87.23% nurses reported that they came across ADRs. 31.91% participants are not aware about how to report ADR. Lack of knowledge about the reporting procedure is the major reason for under-reporting. Conclusions: The majority of nurses has good knowledge and attitude toward PV and understand the need for reporting in our study, but unfortunately the actual practice of ADR reporting is still deficient among them. Training programs and continued medical education type of interventions periodically can improve the knowledge toward PV.