Drug utilization research in Africa

Abstract

Africa has been described as perhaps the wealthiest piece of Earth, given its natural resources, fertile land, precious minerals, and biodiversity. In most African countries, the health systems consist mainly of public health sectors for which governments must provide, whereas a small minority have access to quality private healthcare. Both infectious and non-communicable diseases are major causes of morbidity and mortality and, therefore, important drivers of medicine utilization. Poverty and limited resources in addition to weak public health systems are the major drivers of the high disease burden and inappropriate use of medicines on the African continent. Two examples of Drug Utilization Research (DUR) studies in Nigeria illustrate how DUR data sources are utilized. In the first example, information was extracted from the case files at outpatient clinics. In a second DUR study, the medical records of outpatients attending a dental clinic of a teaching hospital in Nigeria were evaluated.