Abstract

IMPACT OF NEWLY DESIGNED, CULTURALLY SENSITIVE PHARMACEUTICAL PICROGRAMS ON MEDICATION INFORMATION AND USE: SUDAN STUDY

Lina Mahmoud AbdeLrhim Mohamed and Kamal Addin Mohammad Ahmad Idris*

Abstract

Background: Patients taking medicines need sufficient information to help them understand their potential harms and benefits. Healthcare providers mostly use the verbal form of medication information, which is easily forgotten and poorly understood. Written medication information displayed in medicines outer-packs and package inserts is difficult to be understood by patients. Visual form (pictograms), with verbal and written forms are prove to be very effective, easily understandable and highly acceptable by patients. Objective: To design, develop and test a set of twenty six (26) Sudanese culturally appropriate pharmaceutical pictograms, and assess their effectiveness in improving patients' use of medicines, based on their knowledge, perception and opinion. Materials and Method: This is a crosssectional observational and questionnaire based interview was carried out in out- patient clinics at public hospital in central of Khartoum North (Bahri). A total 385 participants of age above 18 years old were enrolled. The data were analyzed by Chi-Square Test using SPSS version 21. Result: Most of the pharmaceutical pictograms were well understood and correctly interpreted. The average result percentage for the top twenty best understood pictograms was very high (92.6%). The result showed a significant correlation between participants perception and age (p value = 0.03). Study results showed a significant association between participants' level of education and correct interpretation (p=.004). Conclusion: Most of the designed and tested pharmaceutical pictograms were well understood and correctly interpreted by participants Pharmaceutical pictograms were found to contribute positively to both understanding of medications and medicines use instructions.

Keywords: Khartoum, Sudan, medication information, culturally sensitive, pictograms.