Original Research Article
Year: 2021 | Month: March | Volume: 8 | Issue: 3 | Pages: 182-187
Identification of Drugs That Commonly Cause Drug Related Problems in Patients with Chronic Diseases – a Community Based Study in Dakshina Kannada
Ambika V1, Abhishek Pradhan2, A R Shabaraya3, Chinju Jose1, Niveditha TV1, Shwetha N1
1Student, Department of Pharmacy Practice, Srinivas College of Pharmacy, Mangalore, Karnataka, India – 574143.
2Asst. Professor, Department of Pharmacy Practice, Srinivas College of Pharmacy, Mangalore, Karnataka, India – 574143.
3Professor & Head, Department of Pharmacy Practice, Srinivas College of Pharmacy, Mangalore, Karnataka, India – 574143
Corresponding Author: Ambika V
ABSTRACT
Drug related problems (DRPs) are events concerned with drug therapy that may be actually or potentially harmful to a patient’s health or which prevent the patient from optimally benefiting from the treatment. While considering a community setting, patients suffering from chronic illnesses usually have multiple diseases and hence tend to take more number of medications including over the counter medications. These patients may also have altered physiologies by virtue of their age or chronic disease. These factors along with the fact that these patients are responsible for their own medication make them disease more prone to drug related problems. There is a relative lack of data and inadequacy in the documentation of DRPs in the community setting which may be because of gaps in the continuity of pharmaceutical care. So a community based observational study was conducted in different places of Dakshina Kannada district to identify and assess the various drug related problems caused by commonly prescribed drugs based on Hepler -Strand classification for a duration of 6 months from October 2019 to March 2020 by enrolment of 150 patients diagnosed with any chronic disease. Medical information was collected using predesigned patient interview forms and data were analyzed and interpreted with the help of Microsoft Excel 2013. Hypertension (HTN), Diabetes Mellitus (DM) were the most commonly observed chronic diseases. Out of the 121 DRPs identified, the most number of DRPs were found to occur with oral hypoglycemic agents followed by calcium channel blockers, angiotensin receptor blockers, thyroid hormones and bronchodilators. The study concluded that pharmacist interventions can play a major role in identification and assessment DRPs.
Keywords: Drug Related Problem, Chronic diseases, Community setting, Drug class.
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