Srinagarind Hospital Visitors’ Opinions for the Development of Medication Mobile Application

Abstract

Background and Objective: Medication-usage problems are likely to increase significantly. Using a medication mobile application (MMA) to deal with the issue is needed to be explored and the opinion of the users has not been studied before. This study aimed to examine the opinions of the Srinagarind Hospital’s visitors about the MMA and assessed the patients’ difficulties in managing the medications.

Method: Descriptive study. Sampling: The visitors of the hospital pharmacy department, Srinagarind Hospital during 21-22 May 2016, were systematically selected. A total of 1312 visitors were recruited based on a sample size calculation of 195. Tools: Online self-administered questionnaires in smart phone/tablet Data analysis: SPSS version 19 and Epi Info v. 3.5.4 was used to analyze frequency, proportions, percentage, means and  95% CI.

Result: The survey response rate was 96.9%, of which 77.0% answered the question without assistance. In all, 71.4% of the respondents thought that the MMA was highly useful (95%CI: 64.6, 77.6) and 95.9% would use the application. The most needed functions were medication manual, online pharmacist consultation and drug alarm, respectively. The most commonly reported difficulty in medication management was forgetting to take the medication (69.4%), especially before meal (46.4%). Most of the respondents knew about indications, allergic symptoms and adverse events of their medications (83.3%, 65.8%, 64.8%, respectively).

Conclusion: The majority of the respondents were interested in using the MMA. The MMA was viewed as highly helpful and the most needed function was medication manual. Forgetting to take medications was the most commonly reported problem.