I have mentioned the Practical Pharmacy newsletter produced by Health Action International Africa previously.
This issue looks at adherence from a number of positions including the factors that contribute to poor adherence, ways for children to take medicine and tailoring dosage regimes.
Adherence: The degree to which patients follow medical advice and take medicines as directed. Adherence depends not only on patient’s acceptance of information about the health threat itself but also on the practioner’s ability to persuade the patient that the treatment is worthwhile and on the patient’s perception of the practitioner’s credibility, empathy, interest and concern. (WHO/MSF)
Although based on African experiences many of the examples and points made are pertinent in Australia’s ‘fourth world’, remote indigenous Australia. The current issue is below or it can also back issues can be found here
Download (PDF, 1.29MB)
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adherence,
Drug Information,
HAI,
Pharmacy,
Practical Pharmacy
Way back in 1997 I first came into contact with the Practical Pharmacy newsletter. The October -December issue was titled “Drug Information for Health Workers: Giving Out Medications”. The next I heard of it was in 2008 with the new title “Practical Pharmacy for Developing Countries” with an issue focusing on Tuberculosis.
Then nothing. I wondered what happened to it. I had forgotten who produced it. However the latest edition, Practical Pharmacy - Antiseptics and Disinfectants (325) (1MB PDF) arrived in my email today and I thought I should give it a plug.
Hopefully it will be a quarterly publication produced by Health Action International Africa and a number of partners. Fifteen issues were produced between 1996 and 2000 with a circulation of 4000. Unfortunately they could not keep publishing the newsletter and it lay dormant until 1996.
… years have passed since the last edition of Practical Pharmacy. However, the needs it addressed still exist. Many health workers in developing countries still have no specific training in pharmacy and have no information to help them in their day to day work. They need tools and resources to help them manage medicine supplies, to prescribe medicines appropriately and to help their patients understand how to use medicines appropriately.
More than half of all medicines are prescribed, dispensed or sold inappropriately, and half of all patients fail to take them correctly. The over-use, under-use or misuse of medicines results in wastage of scarce resources, especially in developing countries. In addition, using medicines improperly increases the risk of people falling sick and dying of illness, as well as resistance of disease-causing microbes to available treatments.
Early editions focused on the basic but essential skills for medicine management in a remote or under resourced health centre setting such as storage and stock control of medications. Newer editions will have a more patient centred focus.
You can subscribe by emailing practicalpharmacy@gmail.com
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Tagged as:
antiseptics,
disinfectants,
Drug Information,
HAI,
Pharmacy,
Practical Pharmacy
