Dispensing Antibiotics without prescription among Palestinian pharmacists; a cross-sectional study in the West Bank, Palestine

Introduction Irrational antibiotic use, due to misuse and overuse, exacerbates antibiotic resistance. Antibiotic dispensing without a medical prescription is highly prevalent among community pharmacies, significantly contributing to antibiotic misapplication. Controlling antibiotic use is critical, as is enforcing relevant laws and regulations. Method: A cross-sectional descriptive study was conducted to identify the factors affecting community pharmacists' practices for dispensing antibiotics without medical prescription and, to determine the prevalence of this dispensing. A standardized questionnaire filled out by community pharmacists (277) from the ten West Bank districts between April - and June 2021 was used to collect the data in a convenient sampling method. The data were analyzed using the SPSS version (19). Results: The findings indicated a high prevalence rate (94.2%) of antibiotic dispensing without medical prescriptions. Amoxicillin was the most commonly dispensed antibiotic, it’s dispensing rate reached up to (80.64 %). The most common reasons for dispensing the antibiotics without a medical prescription were “the effectiveness of a specific antibiotic (83.8 %)”, “patients' inability to see a doctor (58.1 %)”, , and “the lack of adverse effects or complications when administering certain antibiotics’(36.8 %)”. While 90.6 % of participating pharmacists were aware of the policy prohibiting dispensing antibiotics without a prescription, 26.4 % opposed it. Recommendation: To prevent antibiotic misuse, officials must enact more restrictions, implement more solutions, and monitor the situation.