Prescribed medication and nutrition of social care patients in Crete, Greece

The aim of this study was to make a systematic registration of a group of 354 social care indigent patients in relation to: their pharmaceutical needs: the conditions for which it was prescribed, its cost, and details of prescriptions. In addition patients' eating patterns relating to and knowledge of how to use their medication was assessed. They were compared to a control group of 153 Social Security patients.

The Social Care indigent patients were of low income, consisting of groups as unmarried mothers with their children and Greeks emigrants coming back home from other countries (Albania, Russia, Georgia, Ukraine, Romania etc.). The socio-demographic profiles of this group reveal an unemployment rate of 74% and an illiteracy rate of 18%. As regards marital status, 20% are bachelors and 12% divorcees.

The results of the study indicated no significant difference between the two groups in the mean cost of prescription (40 ECU for Social Care patients vs 32 ECU for Social Security patients), in the mean number of medication per prescription (2.6 vs 2.6 respectively), in the percentages of the Daily Defined Doses and the cost of the various categories of drugs. For both groups, the most common drugs were those of the Cardiovascular system (30% vs 26%), Gastrointestinal system (17% vs 27%) and Nervous system (16% vs 18%). The most common diagnosis was Hypertension (10% vs 8%) and the most common drugs were Ranitidine (3% vs 2%), Diclofenac (3% vs 3%), Salbutamol (3% vs 3%) and Paracetamol (2% vs 2%). Significant differences between Social Care patients to Social Security patients respectively were found regarding: knowing how to take their medication correctly (47% vs 77%), knowing for how long treatment needed to be taken (21% vs 43%), requesting information from the pharmacist (39% vs 68%) knowledge of dietary instructions regarding medication (17% vs 41%) and in smoking more than 20 cigarettes per day (15% vs 3%).

The results indicated that the Social Care patients, in comparison with the patients of the Social Security, need more education and more help in the area of the proper use of drugs and in the personal contact that this procedure involves.