'Tell patients about antibiotics'
KUALA LUMPUR, Tues. - Doctors who prescribe antibiotics to their patients must explain to them the importance of completing the course, Pharmaceutical Association of Malaysia president Dr Choe Tong Seng said today.
"Patients must finish the course as bacteria may develop resistance towards the antibiotics," he said.
Doctors, he added, must also prescribe the full dosage to their patients to ensure that the treatment is effective.
He was responding to a call by deputy director general of Health Datuk Dr Ismail Merican for doctors to be more rational in prescribing antibiotics to patients in order to prevent antimicrobial resistance, a situation where microbes become resistant to the antibiotics.
"If a patient requires a five-day dose, then it should be prescribed as such and not three days," Choe added.
On a report in a local daily today that marketing tactics of drug companies were partly responsible for antibiotic abuse, he said the companies merely provided the necessary information to the medical fraternity to sell their products and it was up to the doctors to use their discretion to prescribe the antibiotics accordingly.
"Doctors are intelligent people. They should know when to prescribe," he said.
Meanwhile a spokesman from the Malaysian Pharmaceutical Society said compared with other countries, Malaysians had less opportunity to talk to pharmacists about the medication they take.
"Patients here have less chance to talk to pharmacists as they would go to their doctors first who will prescribe and dispense the medication," said the spokesperson who declined t be named.
In comparison with countries like the US, UK and Australia, he said patients there were more aware of the antibiotics and other medication they take because many obtained them from pharmacists who will educate them further.
"There, the pharmacists will explain to the patients on the right usage of the medication."