ArticleJournal of pharmaceutical policy and practice2025
Antibiotics stewardship: prevalence, nature, and factors associated with dispensing of antibiotics without prescription among community pharmacists in Nigeria.
Article in Journal of pharmaceutical policy and practice, 2025. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 6 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
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Who cites it
6 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.
- Non-prescription antibiotic dispensing in community pharmacies in LMICs: a systematic review of prevalence, drivers, and policy implications.BMC health services research · 2026Pooled it
- Genomic determinants of fluoroquinolone resistance in Escherichia coli in Nigeria: dominance of QRDR mutations and limited contribution of PMQR in a cross-sectional study.BMC medical genomics · 2026Article
- Article
- Building behaviour change systems for antimicrobial resistance response in Nigeria by leveraging insights from mass gatherings awareness efforts (2017-2023).Mass gathering medicine (Amsterdam, Netherlands) · 2026Article
- Prescription-only medicine requests by clients: Insights from community pharmacies.Exploratory research in clinical and social pharmacy · 2026Article
- Antimicrobial stewardship in community pharmacies in Uyo, Akwa Ibom State: practices, barriers, and facilitators.Antimicrobial stewardship & healthcare epidemiology : ASHE · 2026Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
6 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Background: Dispensing antibiotics without a prescription is common among community pharmacists in low- and middle-income countries despite its association with antibiotic resistance. This study describes the prevalence and nature of dispensing antibiotics without prescription among community pharmacists in Nigeria and its associated factors. Method: A cross-sectional study was conducted among community pharmacists in Nigeria with a validated, online, self-administered questionnaire. Reliability was assessed with Cronbach's alpha. Descriptive and inferential statistics were performed with SPSS Version 2023 at a 0.05% significance level. Result: A total of 420 community pharmacists participated in the study. The Reliability result was 0.860, implying the data collection tool's perfect internal consistency. Independent pharmacies represented 87.4% of the respondents, and most were in urban areas (71.4%). Most respondents (98.1%) dispensed antibiotics without prescription, with (84.2%) sometimes requesting laboratory investigations before dispensing antibiotics. Cephalosporin (74.8%), penicillin (70.2%), and quinolones (68.3%) were the major classes of antibiotics dispensed. The pharmacists' confidence in their clinical skills (78.8%), ability of the antibiotics to cover a broader range of microorganisms (78.0%), inability of patients to access healthcare services in other places (67.3%), emergencies (58.3%), affordability (49.0%), patients' demand (38.2%), absence of sanctions (34%), not getting prescriptions (33.1%), were the key deciding factors for the pharmacists to dispense antibiotics without prescription or substitute class of antibiotics. Factors like financial incentives, fear of losing clients, fear of expiry, competition from other pharmacies, and trust in patients' self-diagnosis were low in driving decisions to dispense antibiotics without prescriptions. Conclusion: Non-prescription dispensing of antibiotics is high among community pharmacists in Nigeria, and is related to various factors. A strategic approach, including mandatory health insurance schemes, prescription and dispensing policies, and enforcement of antimicrobial stewardship regulations by the Nigerian government, is necessary to improve ethical practice and address the irrational dispensing and use of antibiotics in Nigeria.
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