Evaluation of the role of pharmacy technician in Egyptian pharmacies / Eglal Adel Mostafa Bassiouny ; Supervised Samar Farid , Maggie Abbassi

Thesis (M.Sc.) - Cairo University - Faculty of Pharmacy - Department of Pharmaceutics

Background Expanding pharmacy technicians{u2019} role has become a universal trend. This allowed pharmacists to focus on clinical services. There are technician certification programs in many countries but they lack consistency. In Egypt, although the term 2technician3 is mentioned in the pharmacy practice law, the health authorities refuse to admit the technicians{u2019} role. The pharmacists{u2019} Syndicate made draft amendments to the law to be submitted to the parliament soon. It removed the 2technician3 from the pharmacy workforce. Although Egypt is the 15th most populous country and the number of pharmacists per 10,000 population in 2012 was 18.15; pharmacies hire technicians and let them deal with medications, sometimes without pharmacists{u2019} supervision. However, technicians{u2019} role is not clear and they have no specialized educational programs. This leads to the occurrence of drug-related errors. Objectives The study aimed to assess technicians{u2019} job satisfaction, pharmacists{u2019} and technicians{u2019} attitudes towards each other, pharmacists' and technicians' attitudes towards having nationally certified technicians and towards the technician{u2019}s current role. Methods two validated specially designed questionnaires were distributed to pharmacists and technicians in community pharmacies in greater Cairo region (Cairo, Giza and Qalyobia) and were filled at once by a direct interview. The questionnaires covered: demographics, technician job satisfaction, pharmacist-technician relationship, pharmacists{u2019} and technicians{u2019} attitudes towards having nationally certified technicians and towards the level of technician{u2019}s involvement in daily tasks. The data underwent frequency analysis

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