Wirat Tongrod. Development and validation of the Thai community pharmacy's standard practice guidelines . Doctoral Degree(Pharmacy Administration). Mahidol University. : Mahidol University, 2003.
Development and validation of the Thai community pharmacy's standard practice guidelines
Abstract:
The purpose of this study is to develop and validate the Thai Community
Pharmacy’s Standard Practice Guidelines. The development process is comprised of a
literature review, brainstorming sessions by an expert panel called a Subcommittee of
Community Pharmacy Development and Accreditation (SCPDA), an in-depth interview
of 20 informants, and a mail survey of 125 randomly selected practicing pharmacists.
During the process, content validation and practicality of the guidelines were assessed.
Afterwards, test-retest reliability was assessed by a group of 39 volunteered community
pharmacists. Then, a patient satisfaction questionnaire was developed to assess criterion
predictive validity of the guidelines, which was done by 1,031 patients who visited the 39
pharmacies.
The developed Thai Guidelines has 45 items, consisting of three standards:
Structure, Quality management for good pharmacy practices, and ethics and social
responsibility. These guidelines have good properties of content validity, reliability,
clarity, and applicability, but the guidelines were not good enough to predict the patient’s
satisfaction.
A majority of pharmacists agreed with the development of the guidelines and the
benefit to pharmacy practices. However, some pharmacists perceived that the guidelines
will be an additional regulatory measure that would limit professional judgement and,
consequently, it would lead to less competitiveness between pharmacy practitioners doing
business.
It is recommended that implementation of the guidelines should be based on a
voluntary, step-by-step, sustainable approach, and be within the context of quality
improvement and practicality. Furthermore, negative attitudes towards the guidelines
should be changed by providing the correct concepts of the guidelines and benefits.
Other measures to enhance the adaptation and implementation of the guidelines are:
training and providing educational information, support from the FDA and other
professional organizations, a model pharmacy, and other incentives, such as waiving the
annual pharmacy license fee. The Thai Guidelines will be a good strategy to improve the
quality of pharmacy services continuously, which will resulted in good quality drug uses
in the community