Healthcare Professional’s Knowledge about Cost Related Medication Information in Saudi Arabia

Abstract

<p style="text-align: justify;"><strong>Purpose:</strong> To explore the Healthcare Professionals and Knowledge of Medications cost in Saudi Arabia.<strong> Methods:</strong> It is a 4-months cross-sectional survey of healthcare professionals and knowledge of medicines. The survey consisted of two-part, demographic information and second part forty-nine questions divided into four domains. It included domain one: Primary or essential information about healthcare providers medication, domain two: healthcare professionals information about the drug-related problem, domain three: healthcare professionals information about drug-related cost and domain four: Healthcare providers perception of medications. All type of healthcare professionals included in the study. Medline Plus health information and DailyMed-INH elements information from National Institute of Health United State of America were used. The 5-point Likert response scale system was used. The questions were open and closed-ended. The survey was distributed through social media by using what&rsquo;s App to more than one thousand healthcare professionals overall Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. The survey was made in an electronic format and it analyzed domain three: healthcare professional&rsquo;s information about drug-related cost through survey monkey system.<strong> Results:</strong> The total responders were (188) Healthcare professionals. Of those 177 (95.16%) were Saudi and 9 (4.84%) were non-Saudi. The gender distribution 120 (63.83%) were females and 68 (36.17%) were males. The most of Healthcare professionals were pharmacist 93 (71.54%), followed by nurses 18 (13.85%) and physicians 15 (11.54%). The most type of medications used was anti-hypertension medicines, anti-diabetic medicines, Skin medications and drugs for Respiratory Diseases. Also, the most number of medications taken either one 29 (15.85%) or two 17 (9.29%). The healthcare professionals showed good knowledge with both complete and incomplete information about drug storage at room temperature 148 (81.3%) or refrigerator 143 (77.7%), protect medication from light exposures 133 (72.3%) and how to behave with an expired medication 127 (70.5%). The healthcare professionals had not adequate information with both complete and incomplete information about prescription prices 110 (59.78%) and imperfect knowledge about Health insurance coverage of medications 69 (37.9%). The healthcare professional&rsquo;s knowledge about missing of medications, led patient visit doctor clinic 35 (18.72%), visit the pharmacy 50 (27.47%), visit hospital emergency 17 (9.24%) hospital admission 20 (10.87%) or intensive care admission 8 (4.79%). <strong>Conclusion:</strong> Healthcare professional missed medication-related cost knowledge. Healthcare professionals may implicate in drug-related problems with burden cost. Healthcare providers demanded of Drug-related prices and drug cost awareness program in Saudi Arabia. <p style="text-align: justify;"><strong>Keyword:</strong> Healthcare professional, Knowledge, Cost, Medications, Ministry of Health, Saudi Arabia.