Documentation of pharmacist's intervantions in Riyadh hospitals

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the rate of and barriers to documentation of hospital pharmacists working in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. A three-section, seven-page questionnaire was designed and distributed to 550 pharmacists in 16 hospitals. Responses to each question were coded individually, and a computer program was developed using the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) for Windows (version 10). Of the 309 surveyed in this study, 301 (97.7%) pharmacists believe that they should document their interventions but, only 114 (36.9%) of them actually do so. Pharmacists with higher education (e.g., M.S., Pharm.D., Ph.D.) have a documentation rate significantly higher (p<0.05) than those with bachelor degrees (76.9% vs. 33.2%). Most of the pharmacists (75.2%) have graduated from King Saud University. Pharmacists graduated from North American universities document interventions at a rate higher than those graduated from Arab and non-Arab universities (69%, 33% and 9%, respectively). The documentation rate widely varied among the 16 hospitals in the range from 0% to 79%. Seventy seven (25%) of the pharmacists were not aware if they have policy and procedure (P&P) for documentation and 47 (15%) stated that they do not have P&P for pharmacists' documentation. Five major documentation-related barriers were identified. These include no time to document (59.3%), no existing system (50.3%), no access to patient’s file (26.7%), not permitted per policy (22.1%), and no need to document (3.6%). The results of this study are important for the future of the pharmacy profession in Saudi Arabia. Belief, educational, and pharmacy management systems of the Pharmacist are possible reasons for the low documentation rate in this study. Recommendations to improve the documentation rate of pharmacists’ interventions are discussed.