dc.contributor.author | Muriungi, Gituma | |
dc.date.accessioned | 2023-07-14T09:25:43Z | |
dc.date.available | 2023-07-14T09:25:43Z | |
dc.date.issued | 2022 | |
dc.identifier.uri | http://erepository.uonbi.ac.ke/handle/11295/163733 | |
dc.description.abstract | Background: Irrational use of medicines remains a significant global problem and more so in Low
and Middle-Income countries where the burden is higher. It can cause serious harm to patients
through suboptimal treatment outcomes.
Broad Objective To assess the rational use of eye medications by health care workers in public
health facilities in Machakos town sub – County using the WHO/INRUD core drug indicators.
Study design: This study was a hospital-based descriptive cross-sectional study design to
determine the rational eye medication use in public health facilities within Machakos town subcounty.
Study site: The study was conducted in ten PHCFs in Machakos Town Sub- County in Machakos
County, Eastern Kenya.
Participants and Methods: The WHO/INRUD core indicators was used to explore drug use in
PHCFs. These were categorized into 3 groups; prescription indicators, health facility indicators
and patient-care indicators.
A total of 690 prescriptions were analysed and the information obtained was used to provide
information on the prescription indicators. Ten drug dispensers working at the public health care
facilities (one per facility) were interviewed and their responses provided information on health
facility indicators. 300 patients were interviewed and their responses provided information on
patient care indicators.
The data collected about the specific indicators was analyzed using STATA version 14.1.
Results.
An average of 1.2 eye medications were prescribed per patient encounter which was less than the
WHO/INRUD recommended range of 1.6 – 1.8 drugs while 75.2% of the eye medications were
prescribed from the KEML. The percentage of eye medications prescribed by generic names was
18.2%. The percentage encounters with an ophthalmic antibiotic prescribed was 62.2% which was
above the recommended WHO/INRUD value of 20.0% – 26.8%.
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In the 10 selected facilities only one facility had prescribers specialized in management of eye
illnesses while two facilities had qualified drug dispensers. KEML copies were available in only
30% of the selected facilities while only two facilities had key eye medications available.
The average consultation time was 5.5 minutes which was less than the WHO/INRUD optimal
value of ≥10 minutes. The average dispensing time was 115 seconds which was within the
WHO/INRUD optimal value of ≥ 90 seconds. 29.6% of the prescribed eye medications were
actually dispensed of which 96% were adequately labelled and 94.7% of the patients had correct
knowledge of eye medications dispensed to them.
Conclusion
Most of the prescribing indicators, facility-specific indicators and patient care indicators in this
study deviated from the WHO/INRUD optimal values.
Recommendations.
The prescribers should be sensitized to prescribe drugs by their generic names, promote rational
prescribing of ophthalmic antibiotics and prescribe eye medications adhering to the KEML.
The county government should equip all health facilities with enough copies of the KEML and
mobilize resources to supply all essential eye medications in the PHCFs. | en_US |
dc.language.iso | en | en_US |
dc.publisher | University of Nairobi | en_US |
dc.rights | Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 United States | * |
dc.rights.uri | http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/us/ | * |
dc.subject | Eye Medication | en_US |
dc.title | Assessment of Rational Use of Eye Medication by Health Care Workers in Public Health Facilities in Machakos Town Subcounty. | en_US |
dc.type | Thesis | en_US |
dc.description.department | a
Department of Psychiatry, University of Nairobi, ; bDepartment of Mental Health, School of Medicine,
Moi University, Eldoret, Kenya | |