Knowledge, attitudes and practice regarding pharmacovigilance and adverse drug reaction reporting among physicians and pharmacists in Egypt: a step toward personalized medicine implementation

Aim: To assess the knowledge, attitudes, and practices of the healthcare professionals working at Children's Cancer Hospital Egypt regarding pharmacovigilance (PV) and adverse drug reaction (ADR) reporting, in addition to the ADR reporting barriers. Materials & methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted at Children's Cancer Hospital Egypt from July to September 2021 using a validated questionnaire. Results: About 37 physicians (20.3%) and 145 pharmacists (79.7%) responded to the survey. Overall, the knowledge (median: 40%) and practice (median: 50%) of PV and the reporting of ADRs were low; however, attitudes were mostly positive. The main barrier to reporting ADRs was The difficulty of determining whether or not ADRs occurred (42.3%). Conclusion: Understanding of PV and ADR reporting could improve the huge gap between ADRs experienced and ADRs reported. In order to be able to assess the impact of personalized medicine implementation, adequate ADR reporting should be well established. Plain language summary Since no medication is completely safe, many of them are associated with multiple adverse reactions that may affect patients' health in terms of morbidity and, even worse, mortality. These concerns greatly increase the importance of reporting adverse drug reactions (ADRs), which highlights the essential role of pharmacovigilance (PV) centers. This study was performed at Children's Cancer Hospital using a validated questionnaire; to collect information on healthcare professionals' demographics and their knowledge of, attitudes toward and practices in PV; analyze reasons for the the under-reporting of ADRs; and recommend possible ways to improve reporting. The majority of the healthcare professionals had poor knowledge and practice of PV and ADR reporting, which clearly explains the huge gap between ADRs experienced and ADRs reported. However, they have a positive attitude toward PV and ADR reporting.