Patients' contribution to drug safety in Catalonia: the interest of personal feelings on adverse drug reactions

Achieving patient engagement in pharmacovigilance: from high-income countries to lower and -middle-income countries with focus on Africa

INTRODUCTION

Patient engagement in pharmacovigilance (PEP) has been shown to improve information on adverse drug reactions (ADRs), which may not be found in reports from healthcare professionals. This review shows that there is paucity of information on PEP in lower-middle-income countries (LMICs), particularly Africa. It provides insights into PEP in high-income countries (HICs) compared with Africa to help identify the disparities and system challenges in Africa.

AREAS COVERED

We discussed the impact of PEP in HICs in comparison with Africa and incorporated two case studies: PEP in Ghana and medication error reporting in Africa using a scoping review. Recommendations were made to improve medication safety in Africa based on the identified disparities and system challenges.

EXPERT OPINION

PEP is at an early stage in LMICs, particularly in Africa, with limited information available regarding patients' contributions to the safety of medicines. There should be further research into patients' roles in pharmacovigilance accompanied by advocacy efforts with policymakers, the development of sustainable funding strategies, benchmarking against experienced pharmacovigilance centers, and the use of technology to improve patient reporting.

Teaching Pharmacovigilance to Healthcare Students: Identifying Gaps and Opportunities for Improvement

The literature indicates that the limited pharmacovigilance knowledge demonstrated by healthcare professionals is the main reason for the underreporting of adverse drug reactions. Therefore, the main objective of this study was to investigate pharmacy, dental and medical students' knowledge and attitudes to pharmacovigilance and pharmacovigilance education. The cross-sectional questionnaire study was conducted at the University of Split School of Medicine in November 2020. In total, 350 students participated in the study. The results have shown that pharmacy students showed a significantly higher knowledge score compared to dental and medical students (P < 0.001). In total 92.2% of pharmacy, 21.8% of dental and 70.8% of medical students had knowledge of patients' involvement in adverse drug reactions, reporting (P < 0.001). Interestingly, only 44.3% of all students knew that adverse drug reactions could be reported using a mobile application. Moreover, significantly more pharmacy students (74.4%) were aware of the adverse drug reactions monitoring center in Croatia, with 47.5% of dental and 39.2% of medical students correctly identifying it (P < 0.001). The results showed that most students felt that pharmacovigilance was not adequately covered in curricula; therefore, there is a great need to increase the knowledge and awareness of pharmacovigilance among students aspiring to become future healthcare professionals, and improve their reporting practice in clinical future.