QUERIES BY TOPIC2005 - 2014

35,67%

29,86%

18,04%

5,77% 5,61%

2,95%2,10%

COURSE

DOCUMENTATION

DRUGS ARRANGED

BILLING

LEGISLATION PATHOLOGY &

PHARMACOLOGY

BIBLIOGRAPHY COMPONUND

PREPARATION

5-10 minutes25,26%

10-15 minutes16,09%

15-30 minutes15,06%

30-60 minutes5,53%

1-2 hours2,15%2-6 hours

0.67%6-12 hours0,02%

12-24 hours0,27%

> 1 day1,58%

Under a minute8,42%

1-3 minutes13,88%

3-5 minutes11,07%

RESPONSE TIME 2005-2014

18,57%QUERIES BY REGION 2005 - 2014

11,67%

5,26%

10,64%

8,65%7,71% 7,29%

6,38%5,40%

2,27%2,40%2,48%3,22%4,08%

0,17%0,45%0,98%1,06%1,33%

MA

DRI

D

VALE

NC

IA

GA

LIC

IA

CAST

ILLA

LA M

ANCH

A

CAT

ALO

NIA

AN

DA

LUC

IA

CAST

ILLA

LEÓN

ARA

GO

N

NAV

ARR

A

AST

URI

AS

EXTR

EMA

DU

RA

CANA

RY IS

LAND

S

BASQ

UE C

OUNT

RY

BALE

ARIC

ISLA

NDS

MU

RCIA

CEU

TA

MEL

ILLA

CA

NTA

BRIA

LA R

IOJA

Background

Objectives

Methods

Conclusions

General Pharmaceutical Council of Spain - Villanueva, 11 - 7º - 28001 MADRID - Spain - Telf: 91 431 25 60 - Fax: 91 432 81 00 - E Mail: congral@redfarma.org

Peña C, Aliaga A, Amaro L, Recio C, Cuellar S, Diez LM, Espada I, Fernandez C, Fernandez D, Madurga I, Martín L, Parrondo C, Varas R.

The Medicines Information Center (MIC) of the General Pharmaceutical Council of Spain (GPhCS) was created in 1980,

fundamentally as a coordination and support center for the 52 MIC of the Provincial Pharmacy Chambers. Its main pur-

pose is to provide information to them as required. It also handles requests from other professionals, primarily in

the healthcare field.

To present the activities undertaken by the GPhCS’s MIC from 2005 to 2014, in particular one of its main activities: pas-

sive information provision intended essentially to resolve any medicine-related queries.

CRISOL is a computer programme created by the GPhCS exclusively for the MICs, it allows for statistical assessments

of all the consultations, which are stored in a data reception file.

Those data that can be statistically analyzed include those involving:

The internal organization of the work, such as the time used to answer a

question, how the question is received and answered (telephone, letter,

e-mail, fax, in person) and the number of questions received in a certain

time period (daily, weekly, monthly, yearly).

Information on the petitioner, such as the type of practice (administration,

MIC, community pharmacist, industry, etc.).

Information on the topic associated with the question, classified by the corresponding area and sub-area

(pharmacology, legislation, etc.) and the bibliography used to compile the information.

The GPhCS’s MIC will continue providing information to both pharmacists to healthcare and non-healthcare professionals alike.

Of the 17,199 questions asked from 2005 to 2014, we find that:

Most of the information is requested by the provincial MICs.

Most of the information pertains to documentation, which includes continuous education courses.

Most of the calls are from the province of Madrid.

The amount of time most needed to answer a question is 5-10 minutes.

Most of the questions are received via telephone.

Results

Telephone88,07%

E-Mail11,90% Other

0,03%

ANSWER TYPE 2005 - 2014TOTAL QUERIES 17199

TOTAL BY YEAR 2005 - 2014TOTAL QUERIES: 17199

2872

1095

18241985 2033

1662 1726

1433 1470

1099

2005

2012

2011

2010

2009

2008

2007

2006

2014

2013

8,01%January 8,56%

February

8,81%March

7,59%April

9,03%May

11,23%June

7,28%July

8,72%November

8,82%October

7,97%September

4,08%August

9,91%December

TOTAL QUERIES BY MONTH2005 - 2014

QUERY ON TYPE OF PRACTICE2005 - 2014

14,46%

1,84%

17,86%

29,06%

7,40%

8,61%

13,94%

1,76%2,04% 1,72%

1,31%

Graph 1

Graph 2

Graph 3

Graph 4

Graph 5

Graph 6

Graph 7

Drug Information Center

Pharmacy owner/co-owner

Pharmacy Assistant/Substitute/Manager

Non-practicing pharmacist

Other pharmaceutical activities

Industry

Analyst

Hospital Pharmacy

Distribution

Official administration

Other non-pharmacists

Cumulative statistics for 2005-2014

In the last 10 years the MIC has received 17,199 queries, of which 88.07% were handled over the telephone, 11.90% by e-mail and the rest by fax, post or in person (Graph 1).

The peak number of queries was in 2005 with 2,872. Between 2007 and 2011,the number of queries per year varied from 1,500 to 2,033. While the number

in 2011 went up by about 5% with respect to 2010, it fell in the threefollowing years (Graph 2).

The months of June and December saw the most number of questionsover the last 10 years. Most of the questions were originally from theprovince of Madrid (Graph 3 and 7).

The MICs accounted for 29.06% of the questions, followed by inde-pendent pharmacists at 17.86% (Graph 4).

As for the distribution of questions by area, most involve documentation(35.67%), followed by medicines information (29.86%) (Graph 5).

The most common sub-areas involved Continuous Education andthe characteristics, availability and conditions for the dispensing ofparticular medicines, which are included in the areas with the mostnumber of queries.

The amount of time needed to answer a question was between 5 to 10minutes in 25.26% of the cases, between 10 and 15 minutes in 16.09%,and between 15 and 30 minutes in 15.06% (Graph 6).

Other activities performed by the GPhCS’s MIC include: preparation oftechnical reports, periodic information exchanges with other MICs, readingand summarizing of scientific articles, cooperating with the GPhCSpublications (Panorama Actual del Medicamento and Farmacéuticos)and Portal-farma (GPhCS’s website) and with the media, coordinating thedistribution of journals and books to the GPhCS’s technical personnel, etc.