ABSTRACT
INTRODUCTION: The pharmacist plays an essential role in the management of the asthmatic patients on account of their frequent visits to the pharmacy to obtain their medication. METHODS: In order to evaluate the practice and knowledge of asthma among the pharmacists of the department of Bas-Rhin, 120 pharmacists were selected at random to reply to a standardised questionnaire. RESULTS: The 86 pharmacists who replied to the questionnaire had a good general understanding of asthma and its treatment. However, only 26.4% knew all the criteria of the severity of an attack of asthma. Among the 57 pharmacists who gave a demonstration of the use of inhaler devices, 16.3% showed all the steps in the use of a metered dose aerosol. These results are comparable to those of non-specialist doctors and nurses in whom poor techniques were found in 63-100% and 65-96% respectively. The mean scores of the pharmacists were 10.5/12 (+/- 1.2) steps for metered dose aerosols, 10.4/11 (+/- 1.0) for the Tubuhaler, 9.3/12 (+/- 1.7) for the Autohaler and 8.1/9 (+/- 0.9) for the Volumatic spacer. The asthmatic patient's main expectation of the pharmacist concerned the use of the prescribed systems (87.2%), underlining the lack of information received by the patient at the time of prescription. CONCLUSIONS: An improvement in the knowledge of the signs of severity of asthma and the use of inhaled devices could usefully be one of the objectives in the training of a dispensing pharmacist.