Methods: A qualitative study was conducted with pharmacists practicing in airport pharmacies from June 2020 to December 2020. A validated Google form-based interview questionnaire was developed, and the electronic link was sent to the participants. Recruitment of participants was continued until data saturation was achieved. In total, 15 pharmacists working at different airport pharmacies in different countries were included. Thematic analysis was used in the data analysis.
Results: The study identified six major themes including type of professional services and medicines at airport pharmacies, pharmacists' experiences, challenges at the airport pharmacy, suggestions to improve airport pharmacy services, pandemics and the role of pharmacists, and business aspect of the airport pharmacies. The study showed that several professional services provided at airport pharmacies, including the provision of medicines, health products, general health services, travel health services, and counseling. Moreover, 46.7% of the participants reported having a dedicated travel health service. In addition, most of the participants described their experience at airport pharmacies as good and exciting as they met different people from different countries. The most common challenges that pharmacists face at airport pharmacies include language barriers, requests for different medicine brands by travelers, and financial issues. The participants indicated that there is a need for promotion of pharmacists' role in providing health care services at airport pharmacies.
Conclusion: The study showed that pharmacists could play vital roles in providing medicines and health care services for air travelers. However, there is still further scope for improvement in this sector of the pharmacy profession to ensure a more active role in travel medicine.
METHODOLOGY: It is a cross-sectional study and was carried out in the outpatient Neurology Department of Hospital Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia (n=272). Data was collected by administering the structured questionnaire.
RESULTS AND DISCUSSION: Results showed that 49.3% of the epilepsy patients were non-adherent to their prescribed regimen. Univariate analysis showed significant associations between medication adherence and the following factors: race, seizure frequency, overall patient satisfaction, medication taste and smell, medication cost and physical appearance, medication effectiveness, complexity of medication regimen, patient barrier, patient understanding, patient role functioning, patient positivity, vitality and general interest. Multiple regression analysis indicated that factors that are influencing medication adherence are seizure frequency (P = 0.048), overall patient satisfaction (P = 0.043) and patient understanding about their illness (P = 0.001). The model chosen for testing the relationship between medication adherence and its associated factors give an R2 value of 25.2% with an adjusted R2 of 21.4%. The F value was also significant (P = 0.000). Based on the research findings, the researchers recommends that clinicians need to play a vital role in educating the patients on their disease conditions. By educating the patients on nature of epilepsy, different modalities of treatment and benefits of adherence to treatment will help in the better adherence and management.
METHODS: The study from March 2016 to April 2017 was conducted to validate the 'Work Readiness Scale' (WRS; Deakin University) using Principal Component Analysis and Cronbach - α for internal consistency. It was modified to a four-item even-point scale and distributed as an online survey to 335 final year students of the three programs.
RESULTS: A reduction from 64 to 53 items provided good internal consistency in all factors: WC 0.85, OA 0.88, SI 0.88 and PC 0.71. The PC domain had the greatest item reduction from 22 to 6, whilst the SI domain increased in items from 8 to 19. These changes may be associated with difference in understanding or interpretation of the items in the SI domain.
CONCLUSION: The modified WRS can be used to evaluate job readiness in HP graduates. However, it needs further refinement and validation in specific educational and employment contexts.
OBJECTIVES: To compare the clinical effectiveness of combined therapy using SGLT2 inhibitor and metformin with monotherapy using metformin alone in HbA1c and body weight reduction.
METHOD: A systematic review of the randomized controlled trials has been carried out and Cochrane risk of bias tool was used for the quality assessment. Patient, Intervention, Comparison and Outcomes (PICO) technique is used to select the relevant articles to meet the objective.
RESULTS: The studies used in this article are multicenter, double-blinded randomized controlled trials on SGLT2 inhibitors with methformin, there were a total of 3897 participants, with a range of 182 to 1186 individual study size were included. Studies showed that combined therapy were more effective in HbA1c and body weight reduction as compared to monotherapy.
CONCLUSION: The combined therapy of SGLT2 inhibitor along with metformin is more effective in HbA1c reduction and weight reduction as compared to monotherapy using metformin alone. Among the three SGLT2 inhibitors such as dapagliflozin canagliflozin and empagliflozin do not differ much in the efficiency of weight reduction. However, Empagliflozin 25mg is effective in HbA1c reduction.