Abstract Medicines are substances used to prevent, alleviate or cure diseases which is an important part of health care. The role of the pharmacist in the healthcare chain is important because they are the patients last contact with healthcare professionals. After this contact they must assume responsibility over their own treatment. The pharmacist's responsibility is to make sure that the patient has received essential information about their drugs and to check that the prescribed dose is correct. The increased digitalization of society brings an opportunity for the patients to increase participation and understanding of their drug treatment. Decision support systems are different methods used to obtain a basis for decision making. Pharmacists use these systems to check if prescriptions are correct, for example by ensuring that the right medication, in the correct dose, has been prescribed to the right patient at the right time. In Sweden there is a decision support system called elektroniskt expertstöd (EES). This system offers pharmacy customers further drug control in addition to other controls that are available through the pharmacy's other systems. The benefit of this system is that the pharmacist has better support in detecting incorrect doses, interactions, duplicate medications and if the drug is inappropriate for the patient's gender or age. When the system alerts, the pharmacist makes an assessment which may be discussed with the patient or the physician if needed. Purpose The purpose of this survey study was to investigate what the pharmacy customers knows about EES and the pharmacists use of the system. Method Before the study started, approval from the southeast ethic committee was obtained which said that there were no ethical barriers for the performance of the study. The surveys were handed out to anyone who would receive prescriptions at different pharmacies in Luleå, Grängesberg, Värnamo, Kalmar and Torsås. The common goal was to spend 20 hours of handing out surveys per student. The results were put together and analyzed in IBM SPSS Statistics with descriptive statistics. Results and discussion The results show that most of the respondents did not know about EES and did not know if the pharmacists are using this support system. The results also show that most of the respondents had not given their consent to EES and did not know if EES could support the pharmacists work. More than half of the survey population answered “do not know” on a question asking if they wanted the pharmacist to use EES when dispensing drugs. Almost a quarter of the total population wanted the pharmacist to use EES and close to three quarters of the total population had no knowledge of the system. This could mean that the customers who have knowledge wants the system to be used. A reason for wanting the system to be used without having knowledge of it could be that customers trust it is beneficial for themselves and for the pharmacists. Building trust and showing care in each customer meeting is important to make the customer susceptible to information. Sufficient information can lead to better compliance in drug treatments. Before the pharmacist can use EES for the first time the customer must consent. Although it was a few years since the introduction of EES into pharmacies, some pharmacists find it difficult to connect customers to the system. It is a relatively new way of working with drug analysis at the pharmacies in Sweden. More practice in the system could provide increased use of it and help the pharmacists decision making. Conclusion Only a small proportion of the pharmacy customers have knowledge of EES. But even so, one fourth of them wanted the system to be used to analyze their medication which is considered positive.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:UPSALLA1/oai:DiVA.org:lnu-74488 |
| Date | January 2018 |
| Creators | Juhlin, Madeleine |
| Publisher | Linnéuniversitetet, Institutionen för kemi och biomedicin (KOB) |
| Source Sets | DiVA Archive at Upsalla University |
| Language | Swedish |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Student thesis, info:eu-repo/semantics/bachelorThesis, text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Rights | info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess |
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