Assessment of Knowledge, Attitude, and Practice of Pharmacovigilance among Healthcare Professionals in Brazil

Abstract

Background: Adverse Drug Events represent a public health problem with high morbidity and mortality rates around the world. Knowledge, attitudes and practices of health professionals toward pharmacovigilance and reporting these events are important factors to promote safe drug therapy use. Objectives: The aim of this study was to evaluate Knowledge, attitudes and practices of health professionals and reporting of Adverse Drug Events by health professionals in Brazil. Methods: across-sectional study with a pretested questionnaire available online on the website of the Brazilian drug regulatory agency. Pharmacovigilance related Knowledge, attitudes and practices and Adverse Drug Events reporting were evaluated and correlations were estimated. Results: In total, 761health professionals responded to the survey. The overall knowledge, attitudes and practices was of 57.7% for pharmacists, 56.9% for nurses and 40% for physicians 40% (considered to be a poor level). When evaluating performance by region, one physician (100%) from the South region and one nurse from the Central-West (83.3%) performed well on this indicator. Professionals in the age group older than 45 years and those with postgraduate degrees had the best performance in knowledge, attitudes and practices. The statistical analysis was performed with the software State version 15. Conclusion: The study identified knowledge, attitudes and practices deficiencies in pharmacovigilance and mapped its main weaknesses, which makes it possible to better delineate measures to address these challenges and improve the Brazilian national pharmacovigilance system. Key words: Adverse Drug Reaction Reporting Systems, Health Knowledge, Attitudes, Practice, Patient Safety, Pharmaco epidemiology, Product Surveillance, Post marketing.