Background: Prescription quality is an important major concern worldwide. Many prescription quality-measuring indicators have been developed to assess the prescription quality and to evaluate whether the right medicines are prescribed to the right patients.
Aims and Objective: This study was carried out to analyze the prescription quality in patients with chronic respiratory disorders (CRDs) at a tertiary care teaching hospital with the use of prescription quality index (PQI) tool and to measure the reliability of this prescription quality-measuring tool.
Materials and Methods: This was a cross-sectional prospective study conducted at the medicine department of a tertiary care teaching hospital. All patients diagnosed with CRDs attending the outpatient department of medicine were included in the study. All prescription details including medical history were recorded. Total PQI scores and criteria wise PQI scores were derived for each prescription. Prescriptions were categorized as high, medium, and poor quality based on the total PQI score. The PQI internal consistency was assessed with the use of item-total correlation. The Cronbachs α was used to measure the reliability of PQI.
Results: A total of 120 patients with CRDs who received 120 prescriptions were included in the study. The mean age of patients was 50.2 ± 13.6 years. The mean total PQI score was 32.0 with a standard deviation of 6.2. Out of 22 criteria, PQI total scores showed a strong correlation with drug indication, dosage, and duration of therapy (P < 0.01). The value of Cronbachs for the entire 22 criteria was 0.73. Out of 120 prescriptions, 64 (53%) were of high-quality prescriptions with PQI score ≥34.
Conclusion: Prescription quality in patients with CRDs was medium to high at a tertiary care teaching hospital. The PQI is a unique, valid, and reliable tool to analyze the quality of prescription in chronic conditions.
Key words: Chronic Respiratory Disorders; Prescription Quality; Prescription Quality Index Tool
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