Consumer perception of the community pharmacist and community pharmacy services in Malta

Objectives We aimed to determine the perception of Maltese consumers of the community pharmacist and of the services offered from community pharmacies.

Method A self-administered questionnaire was developed and psychometrically evaluated. Fifty community pharmacies were chosen by stratified random sampling and the questionnaire was distributed to 500 consumers, 10 from each pharmacy, selected by convenience sampling. Descriptive statistics were undertaken.

Key findings The majority of the consumers were very or fairly satisfied with various pharmacist characteristics, such as pharmacist efficiency when dealing with requests (95%), provision of instructions on how to take medications (94%), pharmacist discretion (91%), professional pharmacist–consumer relationship (90%), provision of explanations on how medications work (86%) and pharmacist knowledge and ability to answer questions (81%). They were least satisfied with the privacy in the pharmacy (69%). Consumers were in favour of the evolution of pharmacist professional services, namely the community pharmacist liaising with primary and secondary care-based physicians (91%), provision of diagnostic testing (87%) and extended opening hours (83%).

Conclusions Maltese consumers have a positive overall perception of community pharmacists and of the services offered from community pharmacies. They were in favour of the development of extended professional services.