Community Pharmacists' Attitudes Toward An Expanded Class Of Nonprescription Drugs

Objectives: there has been considerable discussion about creating a third class of drugs which would not require a prescription, but require a pharmacist's consultation upon purchase. Very recently the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) held a hearing which repositioned a third class as an expanded nonprescription drug class termed as the "new paradigm" using certain innovative technologies. The specific objectives of this study were to: 1) measure community pharmacists' attitudes toward an expanded nonprescription drug class under the FDA’s proposed "new paradigm"; 2) determine if attitudes of community pharmacists toward an expanded nonprescription drug class under the FDA’s proposed "new paradigm" differ by type of practice setting, location of community pharmacy, region in which the practice is located, degrees earned, years actively practicing pharmacy, position in the pharmacy, perceived workload, and pharmacy association affiliation; and 3) determine which drugs community pharmacists believe would be acceptable additions to an expanded definition of nonprescription drugs under the FDA’s proposed "new paradigm". Methods: this cross-sectional study was conducted using a self-report, web-based survey. 462 completed responses from a national convenience sample of community pharmacists were obtained. The survey items were either obtained from the existing scales in the literature or developed based on the FDA’s proposed guidelines for the new paradigm. A principal components analysis (pca) with varimax rotation and reliability analyses were conducted to determine the factors affecting community pharmacists' attitudes toward the new paradigm. Multivariate analysis of variance (manova) was used to determine whether attitudes toward the new paradigm differed based on aforementioned respondent characteristics. Results and conclusions: respondents were generally positive about the provision of patient care under the proposed new paradigm. The results from the pca suggested that community pharmacists' attitudes toward the new paradigm is comprised of six factors including patient care, workflow, patient safety, non-pharmacist providers, pharmacist burden and access. Respondent attitudes differed based on certain practice and demographic variables. Not surprisingly, the majority of respondents indicated that plavixâ® and ambienâ® should still be dispensed as prescription drugs even upon implementation of the "new paradigm" while lipitorâ®, glucophageâ®, viagraâ® could be switched to the "new paradigm".

Name thesis:degree_name

M.S. in Pharmaceutical Science

Level thesis:degree_level

Thesis

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Pharmacy Administration

Year dc:date.available

2013

Author dc:creator

• Shah, Ruchitbhai Mukesh

Contributors dc:contributor

• Erin R. Holmes
• Amit S. Patel
• Donna West-Strum

• Attitudes
• Community Pharmacist
• New Paradigm
• Nonprescription
• Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences

Repository record dc:identifier

https://egrove.olemiss.edu/etd/1100

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:egrove.olemiss.edu:etd-2099