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Patients' Use and Perception of Medication Information Leaflets

Background: Federal law mandates that at least 95% of patients receive useful written information with new medications. Recent data concerning whether patients read such leaflets are lacking. Objectives: To evaluate whether patients read non–manufacturer-developed leaflets and assess patients' opinions concerning the understandability and usefulness of these leaflets. Methods: Patients were surveyed at 32 community pharmacies in the New York City metropolitan area. The main outcome measures were the percentage of patients who read the leaflet provided with new and refilled medications and the perceived understandability and usefulness of the leaflet. Descriptive statistics were used to analyze the results. Results: A total of 307 patients were surveyed. For leaflets provided with new medications, 151 (49.2%), 65 (21.2%), 49 (16.0%), and 42 (13.7%) reported reading the leaflets always, often, seldom, or never, respectively. For refilled medications, 64 (21.6%), 41 (13.9%), 78 (26.4%), and 113 (38.2%) of the 296 respondents reported reading the leaflets always, often, seldom, or never, respectively. Of 267 patients who read the leaflets provided with new or refilled prescriptions at least seldom, 258 (96.6%) responded to the question concerning its understandability and 257 (96.3%) responded to the question concerning its usefulness. One hundred forty-five (56.2%), 89 (34.5%), 22 (8.5%), and 2 (0.8%) reported that the leaflet was very easy, somewhat easy, somewhat difficult, and very difficult to understand, respectively, and 164 (63.8%), 90 (35.0%), and 3 (1.2%) reported that the leaflet was very useful, somewhat useful, and not useful, respectively. Conclusions: Approximately two-thirds of the patients surveyed reported reading the leaflets provided with new medications at least often. The majority reported the leaflets to be useful and easy to understand. Pharmacists should advocate reading the leaflet and promote it as a useful resource. The leaflet should not replace the pharmacist's obligation to provide verbal counseling.