Patient Counseling Practices among Community Pharmacists in Qatar

Abstract

Patient counseling is a term used in the field of pharmacy to describe the communication that takes place between a pharmacist and a patient in regards to his or her medication therapy. Patient counseling is deemed to be the professional responsibility of pharmacists. Patients require education on the proper use of medications to improve therapeutic outcomes and avoid treatment failure. 1 Pharmacists are in an excellent position to provide this type of education and counseling to patients, and are readily accessible to the public as a first point of contact for patients with medical inquiries. 2 Several studies have shown that counseling provided by pharmacists can prevent medication related problems, improve patient compliance with medications, and contribute to positive therapeutic outcomes. 3, 4 Patient counseling practices among Arab countries are not clearly identified in literature or mandated by governing authorities or agencies. The reason may be the low expectation by the public of the pharmacist who for so long had confined their role to filling and selling medications. Many studies have identified various aspects such as the busyness of the pharmacies and the education, age, and attitude of the pharmacists as barriers for the provision of counseling. 4 The assessment of these barriers in addition to patient characteristics will assist in further evaluating and understanding pharmacist's counseling practices in community pharmacies. Since patient counseling is an essential element of patient care, investigating the current state of patient counseling practices in Qatar is necessary. One of the methods that help to gain an accurate assessment of pharmacist's counseling practices is to observe pharmacists in their natural environment without prior knowledge to the minimize the Hawthorne effect. 5 Therefore, to lessen the potential Hawthorne effect (change in someone's behavior due to the knowledge that s/he is being observed), this research project will utilize simulated patients (also known as mystery shopper) to examine the counseling practices of community pharmacists in Qatar. The objectives of this research project are to evaluate the quality of patient counseling practices by community pharmacists in Qatar and to determine if an association exists between the content of patient counseling and the characteristics of community pharmacists, patients, and community pharmacies.