Prescription pattern of anti-malarial drugs in a tertiary care hospital

Objective: To evaluate the prescribing pattern of anti malarial drugs in a tertiary care hospital. Methods: A prospective cross sectional study was conducted for 6 months of patients visiting in Basaveshwar Teaching and General Hospital, Gulbarga. Data were analyzed for various drug use indicators. Results: A total of 212 prescriptions were collected, with 136 (64.15%) male and 76(35.85%) female. There were 128 (60.37%) Plasmodium vivax eases and 84 (39.63%) Plasmodium falciparum cases. All Plasmodium virax cases were treated with chloroquine alone and among these 16 (12.5%) recieved radical treatment with primaquine along with chloroquine. Among 84 patients with Pasmodium falciparum, 40 patients received single drug such as quinine/ mefloquinine/artesunate/arteether. Another 44 patients received multidrug regime like, quinine+artesunate (54.54%), quinine+mefloquine (27.27%) and quinine+arteether (18.18%). Cliloroquine was not administered to any of the patients with Plasmodium falciparum malaria. The most common adverse effects with chloroquine were anorexia, nausea, Vomiting and tinnitus in 9.37% of the cases. With quinine it was nausea and vomiting in 17.64%, tinnitus in 11.76% and hypoglycemia in 2.1% of cases. Conclusions: Our study found the perennial favorites like chloroquine for Plasmodium vivax and quinine for Plasmodium falciparum were the most effective drug. In the severe Plasmodium falciparum cases the artesunate derivatives and combination of artesunate with quinine/mefloquine were most effective with fewer incidences of side effects.