Factors Affecting the Knowledge and Practice of Drug Management among Healthcare Workers in Primary Health Centers in South-East, Nigeria

The knowledge of health workers regarding their management of drugs is very important in ensuring good health. One of the major indices of the performance of primary health care (PHC) remains improved access to essential drugs as they are the link between patients and health services. Consequently, their availability or absence will contribute to a positive or negative impact on health. This was a quasi-experimental study, carried out in Anambra state, which compared the intervention and control groups following the training and provision of drug management tools to PHC workers in the intervention group. A multi-stage sampling technique was used to select 264 health workers from 132 health centers from two senatorial zones in the State, one acting as a control group and the other as an intervention group. Data was collected using a pre-tested in-depth interview guide and semi-structured interviewer administered questionnaire. Statistical analysis was conducted using SPSS at a statistical significance level of p value less than 0.05, while qualitative data was analyzed using N-Vivo. Several factors such as age, sex, educational qualification, cadre of staff, years of practice and PHC workers’ previous training were identified as affecting the knowledge and practice of drug management. The majority (72.0% and 71.2%) in intervention and control groups respectively said inadequate information or lack of knowledge was the main reason for poor practices while the proportion with low interest of health workers for drug management was (38.5%) for intervention and (59.8%) for the control group and the difference between the groups was statistically significant (p = 0.034). In conclusion, this study has shown that age, sex, educational qualification, cadre of staff, years of practice and PHC workers’ previous training were factors associated with health workers’ knowledge and practice of drug management. The study recommends the development of Aide Memoire and conduct of training and retraining on drug management to improve both knowledge and practice of drug management in PHCs in Nigeria.

Effect of Professional Designation on the Level of Task Performance by Community Health Workers in Enugu State

The study aimed at assessment of level of task performance of Primary Health Care Worker （PHCWs） according to their professional designations in selected Local Government Areas （LGA） in Enugu State. Descriptive survey research was used. 291 PHCWs were randomly selected from 9 LGA using a multistage method. Questionnaire was used to collect data and the instrument was validated using test-retest method with correlation coefficient of 0.79. The findings show that Community Health Extension Workers （CHEWs） performed higher than Environmental Health Officer （EVO） and Community Health Officers （CHOs） in the area of health education concerning prevailing health problems and method of control. They scored 66.09% as against 52.8% and 60.61% for EVO and CHEW respectively. The result showed that the professional designation has no significant effect （P 〈 0.05） on the level of task performed by PHCW and their levels of task performance were low. It was recommended that public Health physicians and Nurses should be involved in the PHC in Enugu State to provide the fight supervision to the PHCW.