Perception on adverse drug reaction reporting by physicians working in southern romania

The purpose of our study was to investigate and to assess the perceptions of Romanian doctors towards adverse drug reactions (ADRs) reporting.

A questionnaire with 20 items accompanied by a letter presenting the study was circulated using Internet and face to face interviews to 532 doctors in Bucharest and two neighboring regions from Romania (Muntenia and Oltenia).

204 (56.2%) of the total number of responders expressed their opinion that the daily number of ADRs observed to be under 5 309 (58%) of responders were never informed about ADRs reporting, 439 (82.52%) did not know that the Romanian College of Physicians is scoring this activity under the "Continuous medical education program". Factors that might encourage voluntary reporting of adverse reactions were identified to be: the easiness of reporting, their periodic information and the training about all adverse reactions reported by doctors and the measures taken. Factors discouraging voluntary reporting of an adverse drug reaction were: the lack of information on where, when and how to report ADRs, the uncertain causality.

Currently, the pharmacovigilance activities including reporting of ADRs in Romania are more of an accidental nature, doctors are less or not at all informed about this activity. Doctors have a favorable attitude towards reporting ADRs - as the majority believes that the reporting should be either voluntary or mandatory as opposed to a small number that would expect to be paid for this activity.