RESEARCH ARTICLE
Assessment of Antibiotic Knowledge Among Final Year Pharmacy Students at University of Baghdad
Ehab Mudher Mikhael1, *, Mohammed Khudhair Hasan2, Sama Zaid Abdulridha3
Article Information
Identifiers and Pagination:
Year: 2019Volume: 12
First Page: 379
Last Page: 383
Publisher ID: TOPHJ-12-379
DOI: 10.2174/1874944501912010379
Article History:
Received Date: 30/06/2019Revision Received Date: 20/08/2019
Acceptance Date: 05/09/2019
Electronic publication date: 30/09/2019
Collection year: 2019
open-access license: This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International Public License (CC-BY 4.0), a copy of which is available at: (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode). This license permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Abstract
Background:
Antibiotics are life-saving drugs that if misused lead to antibiotic resistance and consequently to a substantial public health issue. Pharmacists have a major role in ensuring the rational use of antibiotics to prevent antibiotic resistance. This study aimed to assess antibiotic knowledge among final year pharmacy students at Baghdad University.
Methods:
A cross sectional study using a newly developed and validated questionnaire was given for 148 final year (5th stage) students at Baghdad University – College of Pharmacy during November 2016. Only 140 students (response rate 93%) completed the questionnaire. The 10 items-questionnaire consisted of 5 major domains: Antibiotic effectiveness, side effects, resistance, use in specific cases (e.g., during pregnancy and septicemia), and the legal issues of antibiotic dispensing.
Results:
Only 20% of students have good overall antibiotic knowledge. The least knowledge for pharmacy student was in regard to antibiotic side effects and antibiotic resistance at which only 22% and 19% of pharmacists possessed good antibiotic knowledge respectively. Knowledge of student was the best in legal issues of antibiotic dispensing. There was a non-significant difference in antibiotic knowledge between male and female pharmacy students.
Conclusion:
Antibiotic knowledge among pharmacy students at Baghdad University was very poor and less than expected.