Attitude and perception of community pharmacist in Selangor towards OTC medicine usage by patients / Zul Yazid Ahmad Riza

The availability of over the counter (OTC) medicines nowadays is very high. In fact, of self-medicating by using OTC medicines also is highly preferable by patients these days. Many patients come to community pharmacies to get treatment from pharmacists since community pharmacists are easily reachable and accessible by patients. However, improper usage of OTC medicines may harm patients' health instead of treating their ailments. Therefore, community pharmacist should have the initiative on assisting patients regarding OTC medicines usage. Attitude and perception of community pharmacists need to be evaluated since these aspects reflect their professionalism and practice in order to help patients to consume OTC medicines correctly. This study is made to evaluate the attitude and perception of community pharmacists towards OTC medicine usage by patients by using a 28-item questionnaire of 5 points Likert-type scale from 'strongly disagree', 'disagree', 'neutral', 'agree' and 'strongly agree'. The questionnaire is consisted of three parts; demographic, Attitude of community pharmacists and perception of community pharmacists. The target sample was identified by convenient sampling. The administration of questionnaire was done by door-to-door visits to community pharmacies in Selangor with a response rate of 88%. Response between 'Strongly Agree' and 'Agree' was reported to be the highest (71.4%) from total response of attitude items of the questionnaire while 'Neutral' response and response between 'Strongly Disagree' and 'Disagree' accounts only 14.3% from total responds on the attitude part of the questionnaire. Most of the respondents responded between 'Strongly Disagree' and 'Disagree' (92.9%) from total response on perception part of the questionnaire while there was a little 'Neutral' response reported by the participants (7.1 %). Overall, community pharmacists in Selangor have a desirable attitude and perception towards OTC medicine usage by patients.