English abstract
Prescription is one of the principle issues in the rational treatment. Irrational use of medicines has become a global problem in many countries. The World Health Organization (WHO) has suggested several indicators for evaluating the quality of drug use at health facilities. Some prescribing Indicators included; average number and type of prescribed drugs, percentage of antimicrobial and injectable drugs, percentage of drugs prescribed by generic name and from essential drugs list and mean cost of prescriptions.1,2 In Iran, national drug policies and regulatory systems have been developed to govern the process of prescription. In a regular drug-use survey, the prescriptions data from all physicians around the country are collected. These data are analyzed by the Rational Use of Drugs (RUD) Committee in Food and Drug Deputy of the Ministry of Health and Medical Education. In a regional setting, this process is done by medical sciences universities and health services. The activities of these Committees would provide potential quantitative and qualitative sources of data about drug use in a variety of local health facilities. The data would be helpful in defining problems in drug use patterns and also in identifying motivating factors and underlying causes including informational, economical, social, cultural and regulatory factors. During the last decade, various intervention approaches have been used for improving the prescribing practice.
