Drug Information Research Articles

DI-QC: A tool for assessing the quality of drug information websites

Given that the quality of drug information on the World Wide Web varies greatly, it is essential to evaluate websites and their information before use. While various tools exist for evaluating health information websites, most are either not specific to drug information or are tailored to a particular group of drugs. This study aimed to develop a tool to evaluate drug information websites for both pharmacists and consumers, and to assess its validity, reliability, and applicability. We drafted a conceptual framework for drug information website evaluation, leading to the creation of a user-guidance type evaluation tool, named DI-QC, which exists in two versions: one for pharmacists and one for consumers. Each version comprises 26 items. The validity of DI-QC was confirmed with an S-CVI/Ave of 0.86 for the pharmacist version and 0.87 for the consumer version. The reliability of DI-QC was also assessed in terms of inter-rater agreement, with results showing consistent agreement across items. To demonstrate the applicability of DI-QC, forty-four drug information websites were evaluated. Using the pharmacist and consumer versions of DI-QC, 38.64% and 34.09% of the websites, respectively, were rated as ‘Good’. In conclusion, the DI-QC assessment tool was developed through a reliable process and is applicable and beneficial for evaluating drug information websites for both pharmacists and consumers.

Lack of information on gender differences in the package inserts of prescription drugs in Japan.

The package inserts of prescription drugs provide essential information for the proper administration of pharmacotherapy. The incidence of adverse reactions for several drugs is known to be higher in women than in men. However, no studies have examined whether information on gender differences is included in Japanese package inserts. Therefore, this study investigated information on gender differences in the package inserts of Japanese prescription drugs, using the drug information database JAMES provided by the Medical Information System Development Center and the Japan Pharmaceutical Information Center. Non-proprietary names of prescription drugs were yielded 1,679 in Japan. Of the 1,679 ingredients in package inserts of prescription drugs, 76 (4.5%) included information on gender differences. The number of inserts that contained information on gender differences in the "DOSAGE AND ADMINISTRATION," "ADVERSE REACTIONS," and "PHARMACOKINETICS" sections was 3, 16, and 62, respectively. Furthermore, in the "ADVERSE REACTIONS" section, 15 of the 16 inserts mentioned a higher frequency of adverse reactions in women compared with men. Importantly, most of the inserts with information on gender differences in the "PHARMACOKINETICS" section mentioned a higher area under the curve for women than for men. Most of the package inserts of prescription drugs with information on gender differences provide useful information aimed at preventing risks in women. However, there is an extreme lack of information on gender differences in the package inserts of prescription drugs in Japan, and we consider enhancing information on gender difference as an urgent issue.

Gambaran Pelayanan Informasi Obat Terhadap Pasien Rawat Jalan Di Instalasi Farmasi Rumah Sakit Umum Imelda Pekerja Indonesia Medan

Drug information services were activities that carried out by pharmacists to provide information about drugs that is impartial, critically evaluated, and with the best evidence in all aspects of drug use to other health professionals, patients, or the public. Providing drug information has an important role in improving the quality of life of patients and providing quality services for them. The purpose of this study was to determine drug information services for outpatients in the pharmaceutical installation of Imelda Pekerja Indonesia Public Hospital. This study used qualitative research methods with a sample of pharmaceutical officers who provided drug information services to outpatients, as many as 100 patients. Data collection was carried out by interview, direct observation, and using a check list sheet of drug information components. The results showed that the percentage of components conveyed when delivering drug information, including the name of the drug, drug dosage, type of preparation, rules of use, how to use, time of use, amount of drug, and efficacy or indications, had a percentage of 100%. While the drug information component that is rarely conveyed is how to store the drug with a percentage of 8%, the drug information component that is not conveyed is the side effects of the drug. The results of this study indicate that drug information services to outpatients carried out by pharmaceutical officers in the pharmaceutical installation of the Imelda Pekerja Indonesia Medan Public Hospital have been well implemented, with a percentage of 80.80%. The results also concluded that the drug information services carried out by the pharmacist of Imelda Pekerja Indonesia Public Hospital, Medan, were in accordance with hospital procedures and Regulation of the Minister of Health of the Republic of Indonesia Number 72 of 2016 concerning Pharmaceutical Service Standards in Hospitals.

PREDICTING THE STATUS OF THYROID AND CARDIOVASCULAR PATIENTS ACCORDING TO THEIR ELECTRONIC RECORDS USING TEMPORAL ELEMENTS BASED ON THE COMBINATION OF SHUFFLED FROG LEAPING ALGORITHM (SFLA) AND DEEP LEARNING

Health and treatment are two of the most important application fields of information technology, in which the problem of predicting a disease is highly important. The physician makes such predictions based on the clinical condition of the patient and the level of facilities and advances in medical knowledge for the patient—information technology benefits from multiple methods to help this field. Accordingly, the patient information storage system, drug information, treatment and surgery systems, treatment follow-up systems, remote treatment systems, etc., aim to facilitate the treatment process. The patient can receive the best services within the shortest time due to these systems and information availability. The doctor can provide services to his patient anywhere in the world. This paper provided a model to predict the condition of patients based on their electronic records using temporal elements based on combining the shuffled frog leaping algorithm (SFLA) and deep learning. Accordingly, the evolutionary shuffled frog leaping algorithm (SFLA) and deep learning were used for preprocessing, feature selection, and classification. Two datasets of cardiovascular and thyroid diseases were utilized in the simulation section to ensure the efficiency of the proposed method. Based on this simulation, the proposed method indicated improvement compared to similar methods in the evaluated datasets. In the cardiovascular diseases dataset, this improvement was recorded as 1.4% and 3.2% compared to the author's previous and updated similar methods, respectively.

An effective framework for predicting drug–drug interactions based on molecular substructures and knowledge graph neural network

Drug–drug interactions (DDIs) play a central role in drug research, as the simultaneous administration of multiple drugs can have harmful or beneficial effects. Harmful interactions lead to adverse reactions, some of which can be life-threatening, while beneficial interactions can promote efficacy. Therefore, it is crucial for physicians, patients, and the research community to identify potential DDIs. Although many AI-based techniques have been proposed for predicting DDIs, most existing computational models primarily focus on integrating multiple data sources or combining popular embedding methods. Researchers often overlook the valuable information within the molecular structure of drugs or only consider the structural information of drugs, neglecting the relationship or topological information between drugs and other biological objects. In this study, we propose MSKG-DDI – a two-component framework that incorporates the Drug Chemical Structure Graph-based component and the Drug Knowledge Graph-based component to capture multimodal characteristics of drugs. Subsequently, a multimodal fusion neural layer is utilized to explore the complementarity between multimodal representations of drugs. Extensive experiments were conducted using two real-world datasets, and the results demonstrate that MSKG-DDI outperforms other state-of-the-art models in binary-class, multi-class, and multi-label prediction tasks under both transductive and inductive settings. Furthermore, the ablation analysis further confirms the practical usefulness of MSKG-DDI.

A Study on Evaluation of Drug Package Inserts in Kashmir, India

Background: Drugs constitute a major part of the therapeutic modality for most of the patients. Accurate and authentic drug information is important for its safe and effective marketing. Drug package insert (PI) is the primary source of such information. They serve very important role in minimizing the medication errors. PIs need to be updated regularly, but despite regulations, studies have shown that Indian PIs provide inadequate information. Aims and Objectives: To check the completeness of information provided in package inserts of allopathic drugs. Material and Methods: This observational study was carried out for a period of 3months in the department of pharmacology, GMC Srinagar. 139 PIs were collected from local pharmacies and drug store of tertiary care hospital of Government Medical College, Srinagar.17 duplicate package inserts were excluded. The remaining PIs (122) were evaluated according to section 6.2, 6.3 of schedule D (II), Drugs and Cosmetics Act (1940) and Rules (1945).Data was entered in Microsoft Excel Sheet and then analyzed. Results: Among 122 PIs evaluated maximum package inserts were of antibiotics (15%) and anti-diabetics (15%) followed by CNS drugs (14%). Considering the dosage forms 60% inserts wereoral preparations followed by intravenous injections 17%. Regarding the various components of Section 6.2 of Schedule D (II), Drug and Cosmetic Act, posology and method of administration was present in 100% inserts, special precautions and warnings were present in 97%, side effects in 96%, contraindication in 94%. With regards the components of Section 6.3, excipients were mentioned in 78% inserts, incompatibility in 49% inserts, shelf life in the product package for sale was present in 28%, shelf life after dilution in 30%. Conclusion: Our study concluded that only a few inserts contained all the headings of Section 6.2 and 6.3 of Drug and Cosmetic Act (1945). Completeness of information has improved a lot as compared to past, still a lot needs to be done so that patients can derive maximum benefit from them. This demands strict scrutiny of inserts by regulatory authorities.

Beyond the Hospital: Redefining the Role of Pharmacists in Transitions of Care

Unjustifiable medication discrepancies or inconsistency are responsible for more than half of medication errors occurring at transitions in care and up to one-third could have the potential to cause harm. Studies have shown that pharmacist-led medication reconciliation programmes are effective at improving post-hospital healthcare utilisation. In Singapore, the Hospital-to-Home (H2H) programme in Changi General Hospital (CGH) focuses on providing care to vulnerable patients transitioning from different settings, who are exposed to gaps in care and lapses in quality and safety. The Home Medical Service by Pharmacists was pioneered in CGH and Singapore in October 2020 to enhance provision of pharmacy-related services by certified collaborative prescribing pharmacists in the home setting. The purpose of this quality improvement project is to identify provider and patient characteristics that are predictive of the response towards this new pharmacy service, which in turn influences the referrals to the service.
 A fishbone diagram was used to analyse and categorise the problems into different factors – pharmacist-, nursing-, physician-, patient-, and process-related. Pharmacist-, nursing- and physician-related factors include poor awareness of the potential value-added roles of pharmacists due to the lack of prescribing experience in the home setting. Patient-related factors include difficulty in establishing the appropriate criteria to identify patients who need pharmacist’s intervention. Process-related factors include potential additional cost to patients.
 Based on the Model of Improvement, several changes were implemented in two Plan-Do-Study-Act (PDSA) cycles. The first cycle was to perform roadshows to the H2H team comprising of physicians and nurses, to raise awareness of the new pharmacy service and pharmacist's roles (more in-depth medication reconciliation, drug information, and prescribing). After three months, the second cycle was initiated by conducting regular monthly case audits with the H2H team to monitor progress, identify lapses, and receive feedback to further improve processes and explore potential areas that pharmacists can contribute.
 After implementing PDSA cycle 1, the average number of unique home visits by pharmacists per month increased from 1 visit to 4 visits, and subsequently increased to 8 visits after implementing PDSA cycle 2. A survey was also conducted to determine if the changes implemented were satisfactory to the team. Overall, 80% of responses were satisfied with the Home Medical Service by Pharmacists in managing patients under the H2H programme.
 This project had enabled us to achieve improvements in several processes which facilitated the refinement of pharmacist’s roles in the H2H programme to complement the team’s current roles and increased awareness of these roles within the team. Lastly, we will continue to further improve other problem areas yet be addressed and together with the H2H team, close the gaps in care for patients undergoing transitions of care.

YOUTUBE™ QUALITY AS A RESOURCE ON RATIONAL USE OF ANTIBIOTICS IN THE COMMUNITY: A REMEDIAL APPROACH TO ANTIMICROBIAL MANAGEMENT

Objective: Infections for which antibiotics were influential in the past, cannot be adequately treated today and the evolution of microorganisms with multiple antibiotic resistance is due to the irrational use of antibiotics. The study aims to help develop effective drug information systems for rational antibiotic use and enable patients to make informed treatment decisions. Material and Methods: A search of YouTube™ was performed using the three keywords ‘correct antibiotic use’, ‘wrong antibiotic use’, and ‘antibiotic resistance’. Video lengths, dates of upload, numbers of total views, likes, dislikes, and comments were collected. The study viewed and analyzed the top 90 directly relevant videos for each of our search terms. Two pharmacologists independently evaluated the videos. For each video viewed, the following information was analyzed: the video's title, the date it was uploaded, the source and location of the video, the number of views the video has received overall, its duration, the number of likes and dislikes, and the number of comments. Results: 90 of the top 422 videos from the YouTube™ search results after evaluation were added to the study for additional examination. The mean DISCERN and JAMA scores were 46.42±10.91 and 2.29±0.58, respectively. There was a high correlation between the videos evaluated according to DISCERN and JAMA scales. Conclusion: YouTube™ videos can be used as a valuable source for rational antibiotic use. This inclusion of antimicrobial resistance topics in social media could be a cornerstone in the worldwide fight against antimicrobial resistance if tested extensively in field conditions and used in the public interest on a larger scale.

Pengaruh Pemberian Informasi Obat terhadap Kepuasan Pasien serta Faktor Pengganggu yang Terlibat di Dalamnya

Providing information when dispensing medicine is a pharmaceutical service that must follow applicable regulations. The best service makes patients satisfied and loyal to the pharmacy. Many things influence patient satisfaction due to varying patient perceptions regarding the quality of pharmacy services. This study aims to analyze the relationship between providing drug information and patient satisfaction, as well as confounding variables. Cross-sectional research was carried out by distributing Likert scale questionnaires and a checklist of types of drug information provided by pharmaceutical staff at the Indobat Padangsambian Pharmacy. The questionnaire was developed from literature studies and has been tested for validity and reliability. A total of 118 respondents who met the criteria were taken using convenience sampling techniques. Data were analyzed using descriptive statistics, chi-square test, and logistic regression. The chi-square test shows that the type of drug information conveyed by pharmaceutical staff is not related to patient satisfaction at the Indobat Padangsambian Pharmacy (p-value 0.580, CI 95%). All variables that are thought to be confounding variables do not have an independent effect on the dependent variable. However, it is known that occupation (health workers and non-health workers) and the patient's proximity to pharmaceutical workers interact and influence patient satisfaction. Pharmacy personnel should provide drug information according to regulations. To make patients satisfied and loyal to the pharmacy, pharmaceutical staff must pay attention to the patient's work background and personal relationship with the patient when providing drug information.

A survey of drive-thru pharmacy services: Evaluating the acceptance and perspectives of community pharmacists in Saudi Arabia

BackgroundThe practice of dispensing drugs in primary healthcare centers has shifted to community pharmacies in Saudi Arabia. These changes increase demand and mandate improving their services; one such is establishing pharmacy drive-thru services. To explore the effects of drive-thru services on the pharmacy profession, this study aimed to measure community pharmacists' acceptance, perception, and satisfaction regarding drive-thru services. MethodsThis cross-sectional study design was conducted in Saudi Arabia between January 2023 and May 2023—comparing the perception, acceptance, and satisfaction of pharmacists who work in a community pharmacy that provides a drive-thru service versus no drive-thru service. Community pharmacists were invited to complete an online questionnaire consisting of four sections developed from previous studies with some modifications. Descriptive statistical analysis and an independent t-test were utilized to test the difference between the two groups (providing drive-thru service vs. non) in their responses. ResultsThis study included 380 community pharmacists, of whom 33 % provided drive-thru services and 67 % did not. Pharmacists' perceptions of drive-thru services differed significantly. Those with drive-thru services perceived lower convenience for delivering drug information and patient counseling, and they were concerned about the potential impact on their health effects (M = 3.15, SD = 1.34) compared to those without (M = 3.58, SD = 1.10), t (378) = -3.32, p < 0.01). However, they recognized the convenience of serving sick patients, the elderly, disabled individuals, and mothers with children in cars (M = 3.71, SD = 1.17), which was higher than those without (M = 4.04, SD = 1.21), t (378) = -2.70, p < 0.01). Regarding the current pharmacy layout suitability, pharmacists with drive-thru services found it more suitable (M = 3.13, SD = 1.14) than those without (M = 2.49, SD = 1.14), t (378) = 5.1, p < 0.01). However, the two groups had no significant difference in overall satisfaction. ConclusionPharmacists working in pharmacies offering drive-thru services recognized certain benefits but also expressed concerns about health effects and decreased convenience for counseling. These findings provide valuable insights for policymakers and pharmacy management, highlighting the nuanced views of pharmacists in adopting drive-thru services.

Incidence and Predictors of Pregnancy in Women Enrolled in Large Multinational HIV Treatment Trials of the AIDS Clinical Trials Group.

Women are under-represented in clinical trials and must often commit to using contraception to enroll. We sought to determine the incidence and predictors of pregnancy in women participating in HIV treatment trials. Individual participant data meta-analysis. We included data from multicountry HIV treatment trials conducted during the period 2005-2019 by the AIDS Clinical Trials Group that included females with HIV who were of reproductive potential, did not intend to become pregnant, and agreed to use effective contraception during study treatment. We extracted data from all female participants of age 18-55 years, including occurrence and dates of pregnancy on-study; however, only a few incident pregnancy predictor variables were available for analysis. One thousand six hundred twenty-six women from 4 trials were included. Over a median of 28 months (6461 person-years) of follow-up, 143 (9%) women became pregnant, for an overall incidence of 2.2 pregnancies/100 person-years (range 0.5-3/100 person-years, by study). In multivariable analysis including baseline age, type of regimen, and country as predictor variables, younger age remained the strongest predictor of incident pregnancy ( P < 0.0001 adjusted for country and antiretroviral treatment regimen). CD4 and HIV-1 RNA were not associated with pregnancy incidence. Pregnancy incidence was 2.2/100 person-years in female participants of HIV treatment trials. Rather than leading to exclusion of young women from trials, this finding should prompt appropriate adaptations in study design and analysis for earlier generation of pregnancy safety information for drugs.

A Cross-Sectional Study of Investigating the Errors in Prescription and Drug Prescribing Pattern among General Community

The main purpose of this study is to access the awareness and knowledge of finding out errors in prescription among general public which include determination of the quality of prescription in hospital pharmacy and to address the errors identified in prescriptions. Implementation of teaching electronic medical record within didactic using drug info assignment. This survey emphasised the need for monitoring and evaluating the prescription handling conducted through google form. Therefore, the present study will help to understand the prescribing patterns and errors to the general community which will, in turn, improve the quality of the use of medicine and healthcare facilities. This following report has comprehensive studies that public have developed knowledge about prescription parts, drug information, self-evaluation, health care factors when compared to previous studies

The problem of anesthesia of regional society (on the example of the Republic of Mordovia)

Target: the aim is to identify the factors contributing to the involvement of the population of the Republic of Mordovia in drug use.Materials and methods. The study was conducted among residents of the Republic of Mordovia aged 14 to 60 years. Here we used a multi-stage sampling with quota selection of respondents at the last stage. A two-stage cluster analysis was applied to determine the factors of population involvement in drug use.Results. The study showed that the population is aware of the seriousness of the problem of drug addiction in the country. However, other questions require priority resolution at the respondent’s place of residence.The article compares the indicators of the spread of non-medical drug use according to official medical statistics and the results of sociological research. There is a discrepancy between the values of the prevalence of non-medical drug use according to the data of the Ministry of Health of the Republic of Mordovia and the data of sociological studies. According to the study, the proportion of the population of Mordovia who consume drugs is 0,7%. The main factors of involvement in drug use were the social environment, the influence of the Internet, and the availability of narcotic drugs.Conclusion. According to the analysis, two clusters are identified. The first one forms the majority (90%) of the inhabitants of Mordovia. It includes those who have not received offers to try drugs, do not use the Internet to get information about drugs and who do not have drug users in their social environment. The second cluster (10%) included respondents who received an offer to try drugs, who were familiar with drug users and resorted to the Internet for drug information. The socio-demographic characteristics of the second cluster differ from the general sample, men prevail here, and the population in the age ranges from 21 to 25 years, 26–30 years and 31–35 years.

Investigation on the accumulation of background and pregnancy outcome information on cases consulted by the Japan Drug Information Institute in Pregnancy.

Since pregnant women are excluded from clinical trials, it is essential to accumulate post-marketing information to evaluate the effects on the fetus of medication use during pregnancy. The Japan Drug Information Institute in Pregnancy (JDIIP) was established at the National Center for Child Health and Development as a Ministry of Health, Labour, and Welfare project to provide patients with information and conduct follow-up surveys. In this study, we investigated the status of the accumulation of JDIIP consultation cases to identify issues for enhancing clinical information appropriate for use during pregnancy and to examine how information should be collected and provided. In addition, the status of descriptions of Japanese package inserts, which are representative of those used by healthcare professionals as a source of information, was confirmed for medications used by JDIIP consultation cases. The characteristics of the JDIIP consultation cases information were that the contents that needed to be adjusted when evaluating the effects on the fetus of medication use during pregnancy were obtained. In addition, the follow-up rate was 83.1%. However, although the number of consultation facilities has increased, the number of consultations has not, indicating the need to further increase the number. It was found that there is limited information on epidemiological studies of clinical use in Japanese package inserts. To improve clinical information on the appropriate use of medications during pregnancy, it is necessary to accumulate more information in the future, and it is considered necessary to consider new approaches utilizing the JDIIP system.

DeepWalk-aware graph attention networks with CNN for circRNA-drug sensitivity association identification.

Circular RNAs (circRNAs) are a class of noncoding RNA molecules that are widely found in cells. Recent studies have revealed the significant role played by circRNAs in human health and disease treatment. Several restrictions are encountered because forecasting prospective circRNAs and medication sensitivity connections through biological research is not only time-consuming and expensive but also incredibly ineffective. Consequently, the development of a novel computational method that enhances both the efficiency and accuracy of predicting the associations between circRNAs and drug sensitivities is urgently needed. Here, we present DGATCCDA, a computational method based on deep learning, for circRNA-drug sensitivity association identification. In DGATCCDA, we first construct multimodal networks from the original feature information of circRNAs and drugs. After that, we adopt DeepWalk-aware graph attention networks to sufficiently extract feature information from the multimodal networks to obtain the embedding representation of nodes. Specifically, we combine DeepWalk and graph attention network to form DeepWalk-aware graph attention networks, which can effectively capture the global and local information of graph structures. The features extracted from the multimodal networks are fused by layer attention, and eventually, the inner product approach is used to construct the association matrix of circRNAs and drugs for prediction. The ultimate experimental results obtained under 5-fold cross-validation settings show that the average area under the receiver operating characteristic curve value of DGATCCDA reaches 91.18%, which is better than those of the five current state-of-the-art calculation methods. We further guide a case study, and the excellent obtained results also show that DGATCCDA is an effective computational method for exploring latent circRNA-drug sensitivity associations.

The OREGANO knowledge graph for computational drug repurposing

Drug repositioning is a faster and more affordable solution than traditional drug discovery approaches. From this perspective, computational drug repositioning using knowledge graphs is a very promising direction. Knowledge graphs constructed from drug data and information can be used to generate hypotheses (molecule/drug - target links) through link prediction using machine learning algorithms. However, it remains rare to have a holistically constructed knowledge graph using the broadest possible features and drug characteristics, which is freely available to the community. The OREGANO knowledge graph aims at filling this gap. The purpose of this paper is to present the OREGANO knowledge graph, which includes natural compounds related data. The graph was developed from scratch by retrieving data directly from the knowledge sources to be integrated. We therefore designed the expected graph model and proposed a method for merging nodes between the different knowledge sources, and finally, the data were cleaned. The knowledge graph, as well as the source codes for the ETL process, are openly available on the GitHub of the OREGANO project (https://gitub.u-bordeaux.fr/erias/oregano).

The Role of clinical pharmacists’ interventions and prevention of medication errors in emergency departments

Clinical pharmacists play a vital role in mitigating medication errors within the high-pressure setting of emergency departments (EDs). This study underscores the significance of their interventions in elevating patient safety and reducing adverse drug events. Medication errors in the ED often stem from factors such as time constraints, incomplete patient information, and complex drug regimens. Clinical pharmacists address these challenges by conducting comprehensive medication reconciliation, assessing drug interactions, and adjusting dosages to align with each patient's specific requirements. Their presence in EDs facilitates real-time verification of medication orders, immediate correction of errors, and close collaboration with the healthcare team. Furthermore, clinical pharmacists provide invaluable drug information and education to patients and medical staff, thereby lowering the risk of inappropriate drug usage and promoting safer administration practices. Existing literature affirms that clinical pharmacist interventions in EDs lead to a notable reduction in medication errors, adverse drug events, and subsequent healthcare costs. In summary, the integration of clinical pharmacists in the ED is indispensable for augmenting patient safety, averting medication errors, and ultimately enhancing patient outcomes. Keywords: medication errors, clinical pharmacists, emergency departments, patient safety, healthcare.

Evaluation of recorded phone calls to Iran’s Drug and Poison Information Centers: a 4 years’ study

Evaluation of recorded phone calls to Iran’s Drug and Poison Information Centers: a 4 years’ study

Medicine and Pharmacy Students' Knowledge, Attitudes, and Practice regarding Artificial Intelligence Programs: Jordan and West Bank of Palestine.

Artificial intelligence (AI) programs generate responses to input text, showcasing their innovative capabilities in education and demonstrating various potential benefits, particularly in the field of medical education. The current knowledge of health profession students about AI programs has still not been assessed in Jordan and the West Bank of Palestine (WBP). This study aimed to assess students' awareness and practice of AI programs in medicine and pharmacy in Jordan and the WBP. This study was in the form of an observational, cross-sectional survey. A questionnaire was electronically distributed among students of medicine and pharmacy at An-Najah National University (WBP), Al-Isra University (Jordan), and Al-Balqa Applied University (Jordan). The questionnaire consisted of three main categories: sociodemographic characteristics of the participants, practice of AI programs, and perceptions of AI programs, including ChatGPT. A total of 321 students responded to the distributed questionnaire, and 261 participants (81.3%) stated that they had heard about AI programs. In addition, 135 participants had used AI programs before (42.1%), while less than half the participants used them in their university studies (44.2%): for drug information (44.5%), homework (38.9%), and writing research articles (39.3%). There was significantly (48.3%, P<0.005) more conviction in the use of AI programs for writing research articles among pharmacy students from Palestine compared to Jordan. Lastly, there was significantly more (53.8%, P<0.05) AI program use among medicine students than pharmacy students. While most medicine and pharmacy students had heard about AI programs, only a small proportion of the participants had used them in their medical study. In addition, attitudes and practice related to AI programs in their education differs between medicine and pharmacy students and between WBP and Jordan.

Profile of Generic Drugs Associated with the Discontinuation of the Supply

A consistent and uninterrupted supply of pharmaceuticals is essential for optimal pharmacotherapy. However, some cases of supply disruptions and recalls have been reported. In particular, the withdrawal of some drugs from the market was occurred in recent year. Nevertheless, the characteristics of these drugs were unknown. The aim of this study was to analyze the ratio of generic drugs and the profile of generic drugs that have been withdrawn from the market. Data were collected from a drug information database for the period between April 2017 and March 2022 and analyzed for characteristics, such as price, number of suppliers, and reasons for withdrawal. The results showed a 1.4-fold increase in the number of drugs discontinued in 2021 compared with that in 2017, with 78.6% of the drugs discontinued being generic drugs. The proportion of discontinued generic drugs costing less than 10 yen (29.2%) was higher than those remaining on the market (15.0%). Additionally, the proportion of withdrawn generic drugs sold by four or more suppliers (67.6%) was higher than those that remained in the market (38.4%). In most cases (78.8%), the reasons for the discontinuation of these generic drugs were not disclosed. This study showed that most drugs withdrawn in Japan during the study period were generic drugs, characterized by low prices or many suppliers. Our study contributes to the understanding of the instability in the pharmaceutical supply chain in Japan.