Drive-thru pharmacy service: Assessments of awareness, perception and barriers among pharmacists in Jordan

OBJECTIVE: Drive-thru pharmacy services have become widely recognized service worldwide. Despite its proven success, there were doubts in its ability to maintain safe practice. Thus, the aim of the current study was to investigate the awareness, perception and barriers of drive-thru pharmacy services among pharmacists in Jordan. METHODS: A cross-sectional study was conducted in Amman-Jordan between February-May 2017. During the study period, 226 pharmacists were approached. Pharmacists were interviewed to assess their perception toward drive-thru services, and to assess their opinions regarding the advantages and disadvantages of this system using validated questionnaire. RESULTS: Although the majority of pharmacists reported that they were aware about the concept of drive-thru pharmacy service (n = 194, 85.5%), but only 27.9% (n = 63) reported that they are willing to register with this service. The most important advantage of drive-thru pharmacy service was serving sick patients, elderly, disabled people or women with child in the car (n = 166, 88.0%). Most of pharmacists agreed that drive-thru pharmacy service may negatively affect the image of pharmacy profession (n = 168, 74.6%), and it makes pharmacists feel more like a fast food worker than a pharmacist (n = 147, 65.9%). Pharmacists working in chain community pharmacies showed better perception to drive-thru pharmacy service compared to pharmacists who are working in independent community pharmacies (p-value = 0.004). CONCLUSION: Most of the study pharmacists showed relatively poor perception toward drive-thru pharmacy service and were unwilling to use this service. More effort is needed to better introduce the concept of drive-thru pharmacy service among pharmacists in Jordan since the benefit of this service is well established across the world.