Knowledge and perceptions of final-year medical students in Yemeni universities about generic medicines

Abstract EN

Objective : To investigate the knowledge and perceptions of final-year medical students in the Yemeni universi-ties about generic medicines.

Methods : A two-month cross-sectional survey was conducted among final-year medical students in three Yem-eni universities; Sana’a University, University of Science and Technology and Thamar University in 2013.

Results: One hundred and sixty-five medical students out of 270 responded to the present study, with a re-sponse rate of 61.1%.

More than 60% of medical students were not introduced to bioequivalence of generic medicines during their undergraduate study, and 80.0 % of them had a low desire to inquire about it during their study.

In addition, more than 60.0 % of them were unaware of the similarity of generic medicines to their brand equivalents in dosage form and dose.

More than three-quarters of the medical students incorrectly perceived that generic medicines are inferior in quality (80.0 %), less effective (58.0 %) and with more side-effects (47.8 %) than their brand equivalents.

The medical students in the present disagreed about the need for more infor-mation on the safety and efficacy of generic medicines.

Conclusions : Yemeni students need to further enhance their awareness and expand their knowledge about the concepts and principles of bioavailability and bioequivalence of generic medicines if they are to contribute ap-propriately to generic medicine use.