Malki Mustafa A, Alnemary Rahaf A, Alabbasi Sarah K, Almanea Dania M
From the Department of Pharmaceutical Practices, College of Pharmacy, Umm Al-Qura University, Makkah, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
Saudi Med J. 2025 May;46(5):529-544. doi: 10.15537/smj.2025.46.5.20250048.
To identify trends and challenges in pharmacists' communication with pediatric patients in Saudi Arabia. It also studies the potential factors affecting their overall performance.
A cross-sectional survey of 170 pharmacists working in different healthcare settings in Saudi Arabia was carried out. A novel comprehensive 38-item survey questionnaire was utilized. The questionnaire comprised 2 main sections: demographic data and potential influencing factors and communication skills with children. The communication domain assessed the degree to which the pharmacist could communicate with a child in 7 main areas. Comparisons of communication performance were carried out by Chi-square tests, and associations with 24 factors were determined by logistic regression analyses.
Approximately 76% of pharmacists demonstrated unsatisfactory communication with children (=8.47×10). Approximately 91% of pharmacists depended on speaking to parents rather than directly talking to children, even when present (=7.791×10). In addition, although 88.23% of pharmacists expressed high confidence in their communication skills (=9.899×10), their actual performance with children in different age groups showed that 63.52% performed poorly, while only 36.46% demonstrated good performance (=4.2×10). Factors which might be associated with pharmacists' performance were identified.
Pharmacists in Saudi Arabia face significant challenges in communicating with pediatric patients. Targeted training is needed to improve communication skills, medication adherence, and children's health outcomes.
确定沙特阿拉伯药剂师与儿科患者沟通的趋势和挑战。同时研究影响其整体表现的潜在因素。
对沙特阿拉伯不同医疗机构工作的170名药剂师进行了横断面调查。采用了一份全新的包含38个条目的综合调查问卷。该问卷包括两个主要部分：人口统计学数据、潜在影响因素以及与儿童的沟通技巧。沟通领域评估了药剂师在7个主要方面与儿童沟通的程度。通过卡方检验对沟通表现进行比较，并通过逻辑回归分析确定与24个因素的关联。
约76%的药剂师与儿童沟通情况不尽人意（=8.47×10）。约91%的药剂师依赖与家长交谈，而非直接与儿童交谈，即便儿童在场（=7.791×10）。此外，尽管88.23%的药剂师对自己的沟通技巧表示高度自信（=9.899×10），但他们在不同年龄组儿童中的实际表现显示，63.52%表现不佳，只有36.46%表现良好（=4.2×10）。确定了可能与药剂师表现相关的因素。
沙特阿拉伯的药剂师在与儿科患者沟通方面面临重大挑战。需要有针对性的培训来提高沟通技巧、用药依从性以及儿童的健康状况。
