Background: Irrational prescription of drugs in children is reported to be widespread. There are scarce studies on the pediatric prescribing pattern especially at primary health care (PHC) level.
Aim: To determine the physicians' prescribing patterns for children under five years, to explore completeness of prescriptions' recorded information, and to analyze the core indicators of drug prescribing at primary health care centers (PHCC) in Qassim.
Methods: This cross-sectional study was conducted on 25 randomly selected PHCCs. All prescriptions, for the first week of first six months of the year 1437 Hijrah (October 2015 to April 2016), were reviewed. Among 25 012 prescriptions, 4125 (16.5%) were for children under five years. We randomly selected 1212 prescriptions for the study. World Health Organization (WHO) specified drug use indicators, and index of rational drug prescribing (IRDP) with a maximum value of 5, were calculated. The physicians and pharmacists of sampled PHCCs were also surveyed to explore prescribing issues.
Findings: The completeness of recorded date, patient age, and gender was more than 90%. The diagnosis was legibly written in 842 (69.5%), while the patient weight was recorded in 307 (25.3%) prescriptions. The least commonly recorded instruction was the drug strength (26.8%), while the dose and frequency of use were stated for 91.3% and 90.8% of the drugs, respectively. The average number of drugs per prescription was 2.35 ± 0.89; 72.97% drugs were prescribed by generic name; in 65.98% patient encounters, antibiotics were prescribed. The overall IRDP was 3.56. Most of the physicians and pharmacists reported availability of the drug list and Saudi PHC formulary in their PHCCs.
Conclusion: PHC physicians' drug prescribing was not at the optimal level of rational use, especially regarding prescription of antibiotics. Creating awareness about rational drug use and hazards of overuse of antibiotics is needed.
Download full-text PDF |
Source |
---|---|
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8060844 | PMC |
http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S1463423619000148 | DOI Listing |
J Trauma Stress
January 2025
Department of Clinical, Educational, and Health Psychology, University College London, London, UK.
The processing of positive memories technique (PPMT) entails detailed narration and processing of specific positive autobiographical memories (AM) and has shown promise in improving posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptoms. We examined whether participants receiving PPMT reported decreases in PTSD and depressive symptom severity, negative affect levels/reactivity, posttrauma cognitions, and positive emotion dysregulation, as well as increases in positive affect levels/reactivity and the number of retrieved positive AMs across four PPMT sessions. Individuals (N = 70) recruited from the community completed surveys at baseline (pre-PPMT), each PPMT session, and after completing all four PPMT sessions.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFJ Prim Care Community Health
January 2025
Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH, USA.
Introduction/objectives: Patients returning to the community from incarceration (ie, reentry) are at heightened risk of experiencing trauma when interacting with the healthcare system. Healthcare professionals may not recognize patients' trauma reactions or know how to effectively respond. This paper describes the development and pilot evaluation of a single-session training to prepare primary care teams to deliver trauma-informed care (TIC) to patients experiencing reentry.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFMicrobiol Spectr
January 2025
Rickettsial Zoonoses Branch, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Atlanta, Georgia, USA.
Mycoplasma (Class: Mollicutes) contamination in cell cultures is a universal concern for research laboratories. Some estimates report contamination in up to 35% of continuous cell lines. Various commercial antibiotic treatments can successfully decontaminate clean cell lines ; however, decontamination of bacterial cultures remains challenging.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFJ Clin Microbiol
January 2025
Department of Medical Microbiology, Infectious Diseases and Infection Prevention, Maastricht University Medical Centre, Maastricht, the Netherlands.
Unlabelled: Current laboratory protocols for periprosthetic joint infections (PJIs) involve a standard 10- to 14-day incubation period. However, recent evidence indicates considerable variability in the time to diagnosis (TTD) between acute and chronic PJIs. TTD is also influenced by the employed culture media and sample types.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFJ Clin Microbiol
January 2025
Laboratory of Animal Pathology and Public Health, National Key Laboratory of Veterinary Public Health and Safety, College of Veterinary Medicine, China Agricultural University, Beijing, China.
Unlabelled: Hepatitis E virus (HEV) is a globally prevalent zoonotic pathogen that is primarily spread through the fecal-oral route, such as by consuming undercooked or contaminated pork. HEV infection leads to an estimated 3.3 million symptomatic cases of viral hepatitis and 70,000 deaths in human populations each year.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFEnter search terms and have AI summaries delivered each week - change queries or unsubscribe any time!