The use
of herbal medicines among Nigerian patients and the tendency to
combine this class of medicines with allopathic drugs while on
hospital admission have been on the increase. Earlier studies
show that community pharmacists from Nigeria believe that they
need more training to counsel patients on their use of herbal
medications.
Objective: To evaluate knowledge base, use, acceptability, attitudes
and beliefs of hospital pharmacists and physicians in South-western
Nigeria on herbal products / phytopharmaceuticals /dietary supplements
(HP/PP/DS).
Methods: A 20-odd questionnaire including an 8-item herbal medicine
question was used to assess the knowledge of the physicians and
pharmacists in the area of pharmacology of HP/PP/DS. Effects of
demographic information such as age, sex, year post graduation,
years of experience and area of specialization on the scores obtained
were evaluated using Fisher’s exact tests. Level of significance
was set at p<0.05.
Results: Pharmacists (51.4%) believed that the training they had
was not adequate while physicians (44.6%) believed HP/PP/DS are
not safe and 18.5% believed they are not effective. Pharmacovigilance
centres were not significantly used for adverse reactions reported
by patients. Pharmacists (67.6%) and physicians (29.3%) believed
phytopharmaceuticals interact with other drugs. Year of graduation
had a significant effect on the perception of the possibilities
of interaction for pharmacists. 5.6% of the physicians and 62.4%
of the pharmacists scored =50% with the questions on use and interaction
potentials of HP/PP/DS, with cadre and years of practice having
significant effects.
Conclusions: There is a deficiency in the knowledge base of physicians,
especially on the pharmacology and potential interaction of herbal
medicines. There is an urgent need for the inclusion of pharmacology
of common herbal medicines in the curriculum of Nigerian medical
degree and an improvement in the pharmacy curriculum in this area.
