Department of Clinical Pharmacy, School of Pharmacy, College of Medicine and Health Science, University of Gondar, Gondar, Ethiopia.
School of Health, Faculty of Medicine and Health, University of New England, 2351, Armidale, Australia.
BMC Health Serv Res. 2022 Oct 18;22(1):1259. doi: 10.1186/s12913-022-08641-8.
Community pharmacy professionals have great potential to deliver various public health services aimed at improving service access, particularly in countries with a shortage of health professionals. However, little is known about their involvement in child health service provision in Ethiopia.
The purpose of this study was to evaluate the level of involvement of community pharmacy professionals in child health service provision within Ethiopia.
A multi-center cross-sectional survey was conducted among 238 community pharmacy professionals from March to July 2020 in Amhara regional state of Ethiopia. Independent samples t-test and one way Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) was used to test the mean difference.
Most community pharmacy professionals were 'involved' in providing child health services related to 'advice about vitamins/supplements' (46.6%), 'advice about infant milk/formulas' (47.1%) and 'responding to minor symptoms' (50.8%) for children. The survey revealed that, community pharmacy professionals were less frequently involved in providing childhood 'vaccination' services. Further, level of involvement of community pharmacy professionals differed according to participants' licensure level, setting type, responsibility in the facility and previous training experience in child health services.
Community pharmacy professionals have been delivering various levels of child health services, demonstrating ability and capacity in improving access to child health services in Ethiopia. However, there is a need for training and government support to optimize pharmacist engagement and contribution to service delivery.
社区药剂师在提供各种旨在改善服务可及性的公共卫生服务方面具有很大的潜力，特别是在卫生专业人员短缺的国家。然而，关于他们在埃塞俄比亚儿童卫生服务提供中的参与情况知之甚少。
本研究旨在评估社区药剂师在埃塞俄比亚儿童卫生服务提供中的参与程度。
2020 年 3 月至 7 月，在埃塞俄比亚阿姆哈拉州进行了一项多中心横断面调查，共有 238 名社区药剂师参与。采用独立样本 t 检验和单因素方差分析（ANOVA）来检验均值差异。
大多数社区药剂师“参与”提供与儿童健康相关的服务，包括“关于维生素/补品的建议”（46.6%）、“关于婴儿牛奶/配方的建议”（47.1%）和“应对轻微症状”（50.8%）。调查显示，社区药剂师在提供儿童“疫苗接种”服务方面的参与度较低。此外，社区药剂师的参与程度因参与者的许可水平、机构类型、在机构中的职责以及儿童卫生服务方面的先前培训经验而有所不同。
社区药剂师一直在提供各种水平的儿童卫生服务，这表明他们有能力提高埃塞俄比亚儿童卫生服务的可及性。然而，需要培训和政府支持，以优化药剂师的参与度并促进服务提供。
