Patients' satisfaction with integrated drug dispensing system (SPUB) service in Hospital Sultanah Aminah Johor Bahru

Introduction: SPUB is the acronym of Sistem Pendispensian Ubat-ubatan Bersepadu (Integrated Drug Dispensing System) which is also a part of the Integrated Pharmaceutical Care. This is a system that provides medicine through SPUB prescription which patient can obtain them from health facilities by referring to a uniform system. The focus of this concept is to optimize Malaysian pharmaceutical services as one of the efforts to maintain better health. Aim and Objectives: Our aim is to evaluate patients' satisfaction level of SPUB among customers in Hospital Sultanah Aminah. Methodology: We used prospective study to observe for expected outcomes such as the use, pros and cons, and patients' satisfaction and relate them to other aspects. Our sample inclusions are customers who apply for SPUB service in Hospital Sultanah Aminah. This excludes customers who do not participate with SPUB service and answer to questionnaire due to incomplete info. A standardized questionnaire is used to telephone-interviewed patients which are picked randomly starting from December 2010 until mid February 2011. Results and Discussion: Out of 50, only 44 participants were acceptable for analysis. There are four cross tabulation data. The result from three bar charts showed no significant relation while only one bar chart showed significant relation. The three bar charts include the differences of medication supplied between previous hospital and referred hospital versus SPUB service from HSA, answering any queries versus pharmacist availability and lastly answering to queries versus having somewhere to speak. While the other bar chart showed a significant relation between the result an age versus reason for using SPUB service (p=-0.180). Based on the result obtained, majority of the patients said that SPUB is an excellence service in HSA (70.5%). From this study, only 2.3% said good service and 27.3% voted for very good SPUB service. Conclusion: We conclude that patients' satisfaction depends on medication supplied and reason they are doing SPUB. Further study should be carried out to identify the root of SPUB problem so that this service can be improved for future use