Evaluation of the satisfaction level of patients attended by a pharmaceutical care program in a private communitarian pharmacy in Vitória (ES, Brazil)

Abstract

The present study was designed to evaluate the satisfaction of users of a Pharmaceutical Care (PC) service in a private communitarian pharmacy in Vitória (ES, Brazil). In this transversal observational study, patient interviews were performed by an experimenter that had no relationship with the establishments evaluated. Data were collected using a structured questionnaire. The questionnaire used a five point Likert scale, in which smaller numbers represented lower levels of satisfaction. For comparison, user satisfaction was also evaluated for two pharmaceutical establishments that do not have standardized PC services. In these cases, age-matched patients were selected randomly. A higher level of satisfaction was reported by users of the PC service, with values between three and five. The higher averages for the establishment with PC service were the result of greater perceived pharmacist interest in the patient's health. As the same results were not obtained by the services without PC, it was concluded that this practice is very important to the satisfaction level of users of pharmacy services.