Type 2 Diabetes Patients’ Views of Local Pharmacists and Fulfilment with Pharmaceutical Diabetes Care in Syria’s Latakia Governorate: An Online Survey Research

Abstract

Assessing the attitudes of diabetic patients towards community-pharmacy services and determining the demand for new services could help monitor and evaluate the therapeutic response. This study aimed to evaluate type 2 diabetes patients’ satisfaction regarding pharmacy care in community pharmacies and shed a light on the reasons for diabetic patients’ non-adherence to treatments. An online survey was conducted on a random sample of patients (n = 196) at the national Diabetes Centre in Latakia, Syria, from April to November 2022. The questionnaire consisted of four primary parts: (1) demographic characteristics of responders, (2) patients’ therapeutic behaviors, (3) diabetes knowledge, and (4) the general level of satisfaction with pharmacy diabetes services. The data were analyzed using descriptive analysis. Around 89% of respondents were satisfied with the information provided by community pharmacists. The patients’ non-adherence showed a maximum as a function of the number of concomitantly taken medicines, which indicated that in most serious cases patients’ adherence was increasing. Overall, most patients were delighted with community pharmacists’ expertise and pharmacy services. This positive image allows pharmacists to expand their duties as healthcare providers in diabetes care, and increase the patient therapeutic adherence by performing a reconciliation of the patient’s medicines, which involves reviewing all patients’ drugs and identifying realistic solutions to their adherence issues.