Beliefs and potential use of prescription drug information sources

In recent years consumersare taking more interest in their health care, including having interest in the prescription drugs they take. This research examined people’s beliefs and perceptions about using nine sources of prescription drug information. The sources investigated were: (a) physician, (b) pharmacist, (c) family or h e n 4 (d) manufacturer‘sweb site, (e) second-party web sites, (f) m&cd reference book, (g) manufacturer’sconsumerphone number, (h) print ads, and (i) television ads. Two hundred h t e e n persons were asked to make ratings of these sources accordmg to (1) the llkelihd that they would use each source, (2) perceived ease of use to obtain information from each source, and (3) how complete the information would be in providmg prescription drug information. The results indicate that the pharmacist and physician sources were in general given sigmficantly higher ratings across a l l of three dimensions than all the other sources. The two next highly rated sources were family or friend and mandacturer’s web site. Television and pnnt ads were rated the lowest among all of the sources. Implications of these results are discussed with emphasis on the Internet as a growing source of prescription drug information.