Although India is known as “Pharmacy of Global South,” 65% of its population does not have access to EMs. Pharmacists play a crucial role in providing quality health care. EMs concept, adapted for a particular national setting depending on prevalence pattern of diseases and availability of new medicines is currently a highly rational and sensible strategy to provide the best of modern, evidence-based, safe and cost effective health care. The study objective was to assess and promote the Essential Drug Use (EDU) at selected tertiary care hospitals and pharmacies in Mysore city. It’s a prospective, observational and survey study conducted in CSI Holdsworth Memorial Hospital, Bharath Hospital and Institute of Oncology and Asha Kirana Hospital; selected hospital and community pharmacies for a period of 6 months. The study was approved by Institutional Ethics Committee. A total of 546 patients were enrolled in the study. Among them average number of drugs prescribed per encounter-10.29, drugs prescribed by generic names-27.2%, drugs prescribed from NEML-77.0%, total number of treatment charts with antibiotics-65.20% and total number of treatment charts with injections-99.81%. NEML 2015 was available in only 8 out of 35 pharmacies. More than half the pharmacists, 60.0% had no idea of what EMs are before the awareness whereas the percentage increased to 81.80% after the promotion of EMs concept indicating an update of knowledge in pharmacists. Lack of knowledge and availability of EMs was found to be the major constraint for inappropriate prescribing and dispensing of drugs in hospitals and pharmacies. EMs, a basic need of majority of population, should be available to all the people in adequate amounts at all times. Periodic awareness and continuous pharmacy programs can be implemented to update each and every practicing pharmacist on the latest updates in pharmacy profession.
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