ArticleBMJ open2023
Are pharmacists on the front lines of the opioid epidemic? A cross-sectional study of the practices and competencies of community and hospital pharmacists in Punjab, Pakistan.
Article in BMJ open, 2023. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 8 papers, 2 of them syntheses that pooled it.
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Who cites it
8 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it.
- Medication errors in community pharmacies: a systematic review of the international literature.PloS one · 2025Pooled it
- Pooled it
- Awareness about opioids crisis, policies and regulation of opioid stewardship at hospitals settings: a nationwide cross-sectional study among healthcare professionals from Pakistan.Substance abuse treatment, prevention, and policy · 2026Article
- Representation of drug addiction in Pakistani print media: A Latent Dirichlet Allocation analysis.PloS one · 2026Article
- Quality of pharmacy services and adherence to good pharmacy practice at points of sale in Punjab, Pakistan: A cross-sectional study.PloS one · 2026Article
- Evaluation of pharmacists' opioid dispensing practices: a cross-sectional study from Pakistan.Journal of pharmaceutical policy and practice · 2025Article
- A Cross-Sectional Evaluation of Opioid Dispensing Competencies in Final-Year Pharm-D Students: A Multicenter Study from Punjab, Pakistan.Drug, healthcare and patient safety · 2024Article
- Community pharmacists' role towards preventing abuse or misuse and dependence of codeine-containing analgesic medications in Saudi Arabia: a multicenter cross-sectional study.Frontiers in pharmacology · 2024Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
15 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
introductionCountries are grappling with a rapidly worsening upsurge in the opioid-related overdose deaths, misuse and abuse. There is a dearth of data in Pakistan regarding the practices and competencies of pharmacists in handling opioid-related issues. STUDY
designA cross-sectional study, conducted across Punjab, Pakistan.
methodThe study deployed a validated survey to evaluate the competencies and practices of the community and hospital pharmacists.
results504 community pharmacists and 279 hospital pharmacists participated in the survey with an overall response rate of 85.5%. Almost half of the respondents 'never' or 'sometimes' made clinical notes in a journal or dispensing software to monitor ongoing opioid use. Generally, pharmacists were reluctant to collaborate with physicians or notify police regarding the abuse/misuse of opioids. Hospital pharmacists achieved significantly higher mean competency scores than chain and independent community pharmacists (p<0.05). In competency evaluation, three priority areas emerged that require additional training, that is, 'opioid overdose management', 'opioid use monitoring' and 'therapeutic uses of opioids'.
conclusionBoth community and hospital pharmacists hold significant positions and potential to contribute meaningfully to the mitigation of harms and risks associated with opioids. Nevertheless, this study underscores notable deficiencies in the competence of pharmacists, whether in hospital or community settings in Punjab, concerning various aspects related to the dispensing and utilisation of opioids. It also highlights the pressing need for the development of strategies aimed at improving several practice areas including the documentation, the quality of patient counselling, the effectiveness of reporting mechanisms for opioid abuse and the stringent enforcement of regulatory policies to curtail opioid misuse. Thus, to mitigate the opioid epidemic in Pakistan, it is imperative to institute opioid stewardship initiatives aimed at rectifying the competency and procedural deficiencies within the pharmacist workforce.
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