• Tarik Catic, Rasim Jusufovic, Dzan Horozic, Lana Lekic, and Vedad Tabakovic.
• University Sarajevo School of Science and Technology, Medical School, Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina.
• Med Arh. 2019 Oct 1; 73 (5): 351-355.

IntroductionDiabetes is the fastest growing chronic diseases worldwide and in Bosnia and Herzegovina. International standards for diabetes care have recognized the crucial role of pharmacists in diabetes management. Community pharmacists can provide services beyond medication dispensing inducing patient identification, assessment, education, referral, monitoring and behavioral counseling. Pharmacists' attitudes toward diabetes are generally positive but do not correlate with the degree of their involvement in diabetes management and frequency of providing diabetes-related services varied throughout countries.AimTo measure pharmacists' attitude toward diabetes management and to identify pharmacy services that are currently provided to patients with diabetes.Material And MethodsWe have conducted a descriptive, cross-sectional survey-based study among pharmacists from Bosnia and Herzegovina attending on of the conferences in May 2018. Majority of pharmacist attending such conferences are from community pharmacies across the whole country considering surveyed sample was representative. The questionnaire contained 3 different sections: a) participants' demographics, b) measured participants' attitude toward diabetes using the DAS-3 to measure participants' degree of agreement to 33 diabetes-related statements, on a 5-point Likert type scale and c) a list of possible diabetes patient support activities that could be delivered by pharmacists based on authors experience and available literature.ResultsThe majority of respondents (86,5%) were female and 53,8% work in private owned pharmacies. Interest in diabetes was indicated by 94,2% while 59,6% completed special diabetes continuing education in the past. All the respondents expressed positive attitudes in all DAS-3 with no significant difference between overall DAS-3 and subscale values. Provided services differ but mainly drug oriented and partially include comorbidity counseling.ConclusionPharmacists had positive attitudes toward diabetes but they provided limited diabetes-related services to patients. Additional special education is needed.© 2019 Tarik Catic, Rasim Jusufovic, Dzan Horozic, Lana Lekic, Vedad Tabakovic.

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