Impact of Pharmaceutical Advertisement on Doctor’s Prescription Behavior With Reference to Educational Qualification of Doctor

Abstract

This study was conducted to develop a simple framework for finding out the impact of the different kinds of promotional tools offered by pharmaceutical industry on the prescribing behavior of doctors. Moreover the study also focused on whether the perception of physicians towards various promotional tools is different with respect to qualification of doctors. Pharmaceutical advertisement is effected by various variables which have different extent of impact. Qualification of doctor is also one of the variable in which there is a difference in impact of advertisement when compared with different dimensions. ANOVA is applied on the data to check whether difference exists in impact of advertisement perceived by education of doctors among all the dimensions. Pharmaceutical marketing is unique as the decision making of buying the medicine lies in the hand of intermediate customer (doctor) rather than final consumer (patient). Thus, pharmaceutical companies try to influence the customer (doctor) rather than final consumer (patient). Thus doctors are the most important players in pharmaceutical marketing system. Doctors write the prescriptions that determine which drugs (brands) will be used by the consumer (patient). Thus, influencing the doctor is a key to the pharmaceutical sales. Pharmaceutical companies try to influence prescription pattern of doctors in favor of their brands by offering various kinds of promotional inputs like samples, gifts and sponsorships etc. This study focuses on impact of advertisement on the physicians prescribing behavior. This research based on descriptive research. Well-structured questionnaire was developed for doctors to identify important variables influencing Pharmaceutical advertising effectiveness and prescription behavior towards medicine. Non probability systematic convenient sampling technique has been followed. Survey was conducted and data was analyzed. This study was conducted on 150 respondents who are doctors and analysis was carried out on the data collected from questionnaire in which the doctor were asked to tick a number that was most suitable to their choice. Findings of the study can help the marketing managers of pharmaceutical companies in designing their promotional strategies especially for doctors and consumers. Some of the pharmaceutical medium of advertisement was found to be persuasive with reference to qualification of doctor.