Volume 1, Issue 1
Page 33
Methodology
The methodology of the study included a survey and a series of practical+ In the survey, a
questionnaire was distributed to physicians who practices in outpatient departments of privet
nursing homes and government hospitals where in the interview, some of the pharmacists,
medical representatives of privet pharmaceutical companies and medical practitioners were
interviewed+
The practical work was containing three major parts+ In the first part confirmation test such as
gram staining, catalase test in slide method, tube coagulase test, culturing the bacteria in
CLED media (which is a differentiating media) and in MacConkey agar (which is a differentiating and selective media) were done to confirm the bacteria used (4 bacteria) in the study+
Then the drug performances of all the six antibiotics which represented the generations of
the Penicillin antibiotic family (except the second generation) on all the four bacteria were
identified using the Antibiotic Susceptibility (ABST) test to identify the best performing drugs
in the family+ In the final part, the generic and branded drug performances were differentiated
using ABST with antibiotic disks that were prepared in the laboratory with the antibiotics purchased from the pharmacies (the drugs that actually reach the patients)+
Results & Discussion
According to the physicians participated in the questionnaire 55* of them
preferred branded drugs and 45* of
them preferred generic drugs+ The
physicians were not willing to participate in the questionnaire until they
were convinced that the information
were gathered for genuine purpose of
university project+ However according
to the information gathered through
the interview the physicians were
afraid that they might caught in a legal
situation as they were only supposed
to prescribe drugs in their generic
names+ Therefor the obtained results
which indicates that the physicians
prefer generic drugs over branded
drugs could have effected by such
reasons+ So it will not be precise if any
conclusion is made based on this result+
The interview of pharmacists and
medical representatives further reviled that the prescribing pattern of
physicians is very much influenced by
the special offers or gifts given to the
physicians by the branded drug companies+ The quality of the drug or the
drug performance is also a reason
that influence the physicians prescribing pattern according to the above
Chart 1.1 - Sensitivity of gram positive and gram negative bacteria
to Penicillin antibiotic family through generations
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