Comparison of the Understanding on Conventional Labels and Rational Use of Drug labels of Patients with NCDs at Lampang Hospital

Abstract

Medication label according to Rational Drug Use (RDU) Hospital project provides necessary information to promote proper use of medication. Lampang Hospital had changed the label system from the conventional labels to the RDU labels since 2016. The RDU labels were larger in size and contained more informations n Thai’s medical name, usage, indication and warning information. The objective of this study was to evaluate the understanding of NCD patients on their medication with the use of RDU labels compared with that of the conventional ones. It was conducted as an analytical prospective cross-sectional study during February 2016-January 2017 at NCDs clinic Lampang Hospital, Lampang Province. One hundred and seventy patients, 90 patients with conventional labels and 80 patients with RDU labels, were enrolled by accidental sampling using pre-post questionnaire regarding reading and satisfaction. Reading 638 labels (321 conventional and 317 RDU) were evaluated by scoring system. Of all 170 patients, 51.2% were female, used medication average 5 item. It was found that most patients paid attention on how to take medication, 66.4% in conventional labels and 58.0% in RDU labels. The RDU labels had significantly higher score than the conventional ones, especially on Thai’s medical name and warning information (94.3% vs. 74.9% and 82.0% vs. 56.6%; p<0.001). However, there was no difference on the indications and usage. The patients expressed higher satisfaction on RDU labels (95.3% vs 68.5%; p value < 0.001). After adjusting confounding factors involving gender, age, education and medication item, the patients had better understading when reading RDU labels: 6.45 times for the Thai’s medical name (95% CI=3.61-11.53; p<0.001), 5.72 times for medication strength (95%CI=3.26–10.04; p<0.001), 1.39 times for drug indication (95%CI=0.35–5.45; p=0.638), and 3.05 times for warning information (95%CI=1.40–6.63; p=0.005). Most of them understand and satisfied with RDU labels because of the larger size, and better information on Thai’s medical name and warning information. Therefore, RDU labels should be promoted in all hospitals to improve patients understanding on their medication.