The opportunities for pharmacies in Thailand to expand their role in diabetes care

Diabetes is one of the diseases with the highest burden on society across the world. Although it is preventable and manageable, 1.5 million people die from diabetes each year. Uncontrolled diabetes leads to several complications, such as coronary artery and peripheral vascular disease, stroke, neuropathy, renal failure and blindness, which are resulting in an increasing risk of disability and substantial healthcare cost. One of the major factors of uncontrolled diabetes was the lack of patient adherence/compliance. Numerous studies showed that compliance of patients in terms of diet, exercise, medicine and physician visits were not meeting a satisfactory level. This study was conducted to understand key concerns, behaviors, and needs associated with health status of patients living with diabetes. It also implies the opportunities of community pharmacists for supporting this group of patients so they can control their disease and the progression of complications which are then minimized. The study was analyzed by both qualitative and quantitative methods. Three diabetes respondents were selected to do in-depth interviews. The results from the in-depth interviews were then used to create a questionnaire. There are 105 diabetes respondents in the qualitative study. 43% of them can control blood sugar under an optimal goal (130mg/dL), 57% of them cannot control blood sugar. It was concluded that there are the differences of key concerns, comprehension, compliance and happiness between the controlled diabetes patients (fasting blood glucose < 130 mg/dL) and the uncontrolled diabetes patients (fasting blood glucose < 130 mg/dL). The controlled diabetes patients had better awareness, comprehension, compliance and happiness than the uncontrolled DM patients.