Evaluation of Knowledge, Attitude and Practice About Adverse Drug Reaction Among Nurses in a Tertiary Care Hospital

Abstract

Background: Adverse drug reactions (ADRs) are one of the leading causes responsible for morbidity and mortality, thus adding to the cost of treatment and prolongation of hospital stay. Hence, detection of ADRs is often delayed due to lack of surplus knowledge among health care professionals especially nurses who play a key role in monitoring and reporting of ADRs. Purpose: To evaluate knowledge, attitude and practice about ADRs among nurses in a tertiary care hospital. Material and Methods: An observational study was conducted among nurses from different specialities of Govt. Medical College to evaluate their knowledge, attitude and practice about ADRs. A self-made questionnaire was randomly distributed among hundred nurses and the response were recorded accordingly. Results: It was found that all nurses had a fair knowledge about ADRs. The overall response rate seen in our study was 80%. Most of the nurses reported the ADRs to the treating physicians but not to the adverse drug reaction monitoring centre (ADRMC). Only 27.5% of nurses had reported an ADR inspite of having a strong belief that reporting is important for patient safety (97.5%). Majority of the nurses (93.75%) agreed on maintaining the confidentiality of the reporter. 77.5% of the nurses were not aware of ADR monitoring centre in their respective hospital and (87.5%) had never heard about National Pharmacovigilance Centre. Conclusion: It was concluded from our study that despite fair knowledge about ADRs among nurses, there is still a lot of work required in overcoming the barriers for proper monitoring and reporting of ADRs to appropriate authority.