The impact of price and pharmacists’ advice on patients’ acquisition of generic drugs in the community pharmacy

Abstract

Aim of the research: examine and evaluate the impact of price and pharmacists’ advice on patients’ acquisition of generic drugs in the community pharmacies of Kaunas city. Objectives: 1. To examine how often the patients are provided with the information of the lowest priced generic drugs in a clear and understandable way. 2. To evaluate what impact price has on customers’ choice of prescription-only generic drugs and over-the-counter generic drugs. 3. To evaluate the impact of pharmacists’ advice on patients’ acquisition of generic drugs. Results: The analysis of the questionnaire has shown that majority of patients (51,2%) fully knew what is a generic substitucion. Only 7% of cases stated that they do not know what is a generic substitution. The survey disclosed, that 34,1% of patients always choose to buy generic medicines, and only 9,1% of patients would never buy a generic medicine. Between two given options of factors impacting the decision while buying generic medicines, the majority of patients stated that the price is the main determining factor (56,7%) and the pharmacist’s advice was the main factor for 43,3% of the respondents