Background: Pediatric diarrhea is the second most common cause of childhood mortality globally. Despite being self-limiting, polypharmacy is rampant in their treatment. The adherence of practitioners to the recommended guidelines can be assessed by drug utilization studies.
Aim and Objectives: The aim of the study was to assess the drug utilization pattern of acute diarrhea management in children.
Materials and Methods: A prospective observational study was undertaken for 12 months at pediatric inpatient unit of BRIMS, Bidar. Prescriptions of 400 cases of acute diarrhea in children of either gender aged 1−12 years were evaluated for the pattern of drugs prescribing using the WHO core indicators.
Results: The study showed male preponderance with 54.75% being males. Every prescription, on an average had five drugs for diarrheal management. About 43.5% prescriptions had at least two antibiotics. Out of a total of 2237 drugs prescribed, 1392 (62.2%) drugs were prescribed as injections. About 78.5% medicines were selected from the National List of Essential Medicines (NLEM), 2015 and 87.12% drugs were from the hospital formulary. Drugs were categorized as per ATC/DDD system using the WHO reference DDDs and ATC codes website. PDD to DDD ratio of majority of drugs was 0.99.
Conclusion: We observed polypharmacy in practice for diarrheal illness in our study. Accentuation on evidence-based management and adherence to the treatment guidelines may help in improved and rational drug use in children.
Key words: Acute Diarrhoea; Adherence; ATC/DDD System; NLEM
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