Opportunities for improving pharmaceutical care in the community pharmacies in Trakai district

Aim: To investigate the effectiveness of pharmaceutical care in community pharmacies in Trakai district and to find out pharmacy specialists’ views on pharmaceutical services in Lithuanian community pharmacies. Tasks: 1. To learn about pharmacy specialists’s features of patient consulting. 2. To find out the attitudes of pharmacy specialists towards their work practices in a community pharmacy. 3. To evaluate the properties of selling prescription and over-the-counter medicines. 4. To find out pharmacy specialists’s opinion about the fulfillment of pharmaceutical services in Trakai district community pharmacies and opportunities for improving those services. Methods: Research participants – pharmacy specialists working in Trakai community pharmacies. Test method – an anonymous questionnaire. 27 forms were given to respondents, 26 were handled back (96% of responsiveness). Data was processed by using SPSS 20.0 software. Charts and tables have been made with Microsoft Office Excel 2016. Results: Pharmacy specialists working in Trakai district usually serve 61-80 patients per day (46,2%), consultation usually lasts 3-5 minutes (64,5%). 84,6% of respondents always pay attention to the patient’s age. 42,3% of respondents think that there is not enough workforce at their pharmacy to ensure an effective workflow. 92,3% of respondents always check the legitimacy of prescriptions. When selling an over-the-counter drug, 61,5% of respondents often ask the patient about why he or she will be using that drug. According to respondents, unsuitable accommodation and equipment, shortage of time and employees, too few lectures and seminars were the biggest obstacles to ensure an effective execution of pharmacy services. Conclusions: 1. Most pharmacy specialists in Trakai district consult 61-80 patients per day, consultation usually lasts 3-5 minutes. 2. A significant number of pharmacy specialists working in Trakai district think that there is not enough workforce at their pharmacy and they are not pleased with accommodations and equipment of their pharmacy, also their working hours. 3. Pharmacy specialists working in Trakai district have responsible views on selling prescription medicines. 4. Most of the pharmacy specialists working in Trakai district are only partly satisfied with fulfillment of pharmaceutical services and according to the opinions of respondents, there is a need to improve the accommodations and equipment of pharmacies, work conditons, there should be a place where a patient could be consulted individually, also there is a need to sign on more employees, solve the time shortage problem, organize more lectures and seminars for the pharmaceutical services to be more effective