2009 Volume 35 Issue 2 Pages 113-123
Public initiatives involving patients have been conducted in an effort to ensure their safety but it is not it known whether patients are willing to take part in such initiatives or not and what actions can be taken.The aim of this study was to clarify outpatients’attitudes towards medication and medication error avoidance and to explore patient characteristics that may affect their behavior in this regard.To do this we devised a cross-sectional questionnaire based on educational materials,the results of a community questionnaire survey related to patient safety,and interviews of 11 patients.It was given to adult outpatients at five pharmacies in Takatsuki-city,Osaka and out of the 394 questionnaires distributed,346 (87.8%) were eligible for data analysis.
Factor analysis revealed four domains in the attitude construct,which were“understanding and monitoring”,“relationship with doctor”,“pharmacist and medicine”,“barrier to medical care”,and two domains in behavior construct which were “practitioner cooperating behavior”and“information seeking behavior”.“Understanding and monitoring”,“relationship with doctor”,and“pharmacist and medicine”scored high marks (mean ; 86.8,81.4,81.6,respectively).“Practitioner cooperating behavior”had a medium level score (56.4),but that for“information seeking behavior”was much lower (39.4).Age was associated with both attitude and behavior domains.There were also strong associations between“pharmacist and medicine” and“practitioner cooperating behavior”and between“understanding and monitoring”and“information seeking behavior” (p<0.01).
The high scores obtained for attitude domains indicate that patients would be positive towards participating in their medication.Furthermore,pharmacist efforts to educate patients and enhancing their“understanding and monitoring”attitude would help in error prevention.
