Pharmacists Preferences and Utilization of Drug Information Resources

Abstract

Objective: The study was designed to evaluate the level of drug information skills for pharmaicst in the Non-to identify the participants’ preferences for drug information resources. Background: The ability of utilizing proper information is one of the essential clinical skills required by pharmacists to fulfill pharmacist’s role as the primary source of drug knowledge. However, pharmacists are facing with the imminent challenge of utilizing proper information as to the increasing number of information. Howard University provides a drug information session to the Non-Traditional Doctor of Pharmacy students to enhance the student’s drug information skills. A survey consisting of 18-questionnaires has been distributed to the participants (n=18) to assess the participant’s utilization skill and the preference on each resource. Descriptive statistics and chisquare analysis was done using IBM SPSS 23. Results: General search engines (55.6%) was the most preferred tool for their drug information search activities, and among the search engines 72% of the group frequently used Google for drug information inquiries. However, only 17% of the participants responded always cross-checked with other resources, and 22% always verified the authenticity of the website. On contrary to the findings, the level of confidence was notably high on their drug information skill (72%), and on the accuracy of obtained information (100%). Conclusion: The observation from the study suggests that pharmacists should be more aware of the possibilities of risking the client’s safety while using Google or other search engines whose information may often not most current and accurate.