MEDICATION UTILIZATION PROBLEM AMONG BLIND POPULATION IN NEPAL

Background: Studies on challenges of the visually impaired population during medicine utilization, their difficulties and the Pharmacist's information assessment towards such population are very limited. Objective: To study the problems during medicine utilization among blind patients in Nepal. Methods: A cross-sectional descriptive study was carried out in 120 blind persons using a schedule at various blind associations, hostels, colleges, and a blind cricket tournament. Participants of at least 18 years and had taken 2 medicines were included in the study. SPSS was used for analysis. Results: We found 60% could read Braille alphabet with most were male (63.88%) population. We found 21.43% only had adherence in their medicines. Most people had faced problem while using liquid dosage form where 46.7% of people spilled drug during administration and even 12.5% administered the drug directly from the bottle. The information given by dispenser was found to be inadequate. We found 65.8% of participants didn't get to know their medicine name, staggering 80% haven't got their medicine expiry date, 60% haven't known their medicines indication, and 75.8% didn't get any precautions related to their medicines. Conclusion: This population has been facing various medicine-related difficulties along with inadequate dispensing information. Results of the Morisky scale showed a lack of adherence in such population.