Comparative Analysis of Understanding of Pictograms among Pharmacy and Non-Pharmacy Students.

The objective of the present study was to evaluate awareness and significance of pictograms among pharmacy and non-pharmacy students. The study was conducted in two public and private sector institutes of Karachi during July to Oct 2013. Altogether 306 pharmacy and non pharmacy students participated in the study. A self administered questionnaire was used for this purpose. Nineteen pictograms from the USP-DI and corresponding set of 19 locally developed pictograms conveying the same medication instructions or messages were evaluated. Respondents were evaluated for their interpretation of all 38 pictograms. More than 98% of the pharmacy students agreed that pictograms attracts attention of people to provide information about medicine use. 97% considered that pictograms are used as universal language that can be easily understood by everyone and they are effective tools for educating the illiterate patients. 97.87% non pharmacy students agreed that patients are unfamiliar with medical terminologies and pictograms may be used to convey the medically significant information to patients. Both pharmacy and non pharmacy students preferred USP-DI pictograms over the pictograms of local origin. It is a need of time to introduce pictograms as a topic in curriculum of Pharm -D courses like Dispensing Pharmacy, Hospital pharmacy and Community pharmacy so that during professional life pharmacist can use these tools to improve patient counseling techniques. It is a way to maximize patient care and provide patient education regardless of any barrier

Pervasiveness of scholastic duplicity and plagiarism among the pharmacy students in Pakistan

The present study was conducted with the aim to identify pharmacy student

The Approach of Pharmacy Students Towards Communication of Medication Errors in Karachi, Pakistan

Purpose: To assess pharmacy students’ knowledge of communicating medication errors in Karachi, Pakistan.Methods: The study design was cross-sectional and conducted from February to May 2014. A previously validated questionnaire was adopted, modified and distributed to final year pharmacy students in four universities of Karachi. Descriptive statistics were used to present students’ demographic information and their response to the questionnaire items. Pearson chi square test and Logistic regression model were executed to evaluate the association of gender and institution of students with their response.Results: Out of 600 survey questionnaires distributed, only 464 were returned in useable form, giving a response rate of 77.33 %. A majority of the students showed moderately positive attitude towards general communication and training in communicating medication errors. More than 40 % of the respondents were not satisfied with the training they received in communicating and reporting incidence of medication errors. Incorrect drug (14.65 %), incorrect dose (8.40 %) and improper storage of medicines (7.97 %) were the most common errors observed by the students during clerkship.Conclusion: The findings indicate the need for a more standardized approach to improving knowledge of medication errors as well as training in the communication of occurrence of medication errors.Keywords: Communication, Medication error, Pharmacy students, Standardized trainin

Determination of the heavy metal contents of frequently used herbal products in Pakistan

Purpose: To determine the heavy metal content of selected local and international herbal medicines sold for the treatment of various diseases in Pakistan. Methods: The different dosage forms of herbal medicines assessed were crude forms of syrups, gel, capsule, powder and tonic. Wet digestion method was used to prepare the herbal samples using nitric acid, and then analyzed for arsenic (As), cadmium (Cd), lead (Pb) and mercury (Hg), using MHS-15 mercury/hydride system and flame atomic absorption spectrometry (FAAS). Results: The investigated results displayed the Arsenic level (0.00 ppm to 0.580 ppm); Cadmium (0.001 ppm to 0.006 ppm); Lead (0.00 ppm to 1.078 ppm) and Mercury (0.001 ppm to 0.012 ppm). All results were found below the permissible limit of acceptability intake of the World Health Organization (WHO) and American Herbal Products Association (AHPA). The pH of the samples were in the range of 1.52 to 6.99. Conclusion: The findings reveal that the investigated herbal products available in Pakistan are safe with reference to heavy metals, and considered non-toxic for human consumption