Drug use patterns at a Kenyan referral hospital: A cross-sectional study using WHO core indicators

Description

Robi Cynthia Chacha and Ermias Mergia Terefe audit how medicines are used at a referral hospital in Kenya, scoring practice against World Health Organization yardsticks. Poor medicine use raises costs and feeds drug resistance, a burden felt hardest in lower-income health systems. Their study ran in the outpatient department of Thika Level 5 Hospital.

The team reviewed 600 prescriptions and watched 100 patient visits, then checked the facility itself for readiness. Standard WHO tools covered prescribing habits, the care patients actually received, and the stock and systems behind both. Yardstick scores like these show managers exactly where habits drift from safe practice. The audit gives the hospital a baseline for targeted fixes rather than broad guesses.

Catalog record

Source: https://europepmc.org/article/MED/PMC13419180