OBJECTIVE: Describe relationships between visual acuity, point size, and readability of prescription labels and provide insight into demographic factors associated with prescription label readability.
METHODS: Cross-sectional examination of prescription label readability by older, community-dwelling adults. Subjects were evaluated as to demographics, visual acuity, and ability to read test instruments consisting of unaltered prescription label features of five medications dispensed by community pharmacies and two drug samples. Descriptive statistics in conjunction with a logit predictive model were employed for data analysis.
RESULTS: Instructions for medication use were most recognizable, identified and correctly read by 95.60% of the study cohort while directions for the use of drug samples were lowest (34.91%). Among prescription label features, auxiliary labels consistently demonstrated poor readability. Level of visual acuity was statistically related to the ability to read prescription labels while identifying prescription label components increased proportionally with point size. Race, gender, and history of a recent eye examination were statistically significant predictors of prescription label reading ability. Visual acuity alone was found to explain approximately 26% of the variablity in ability to read Rx labels.
CONCLUSIONS: Visual acuity is predictive of the ability to access Rx label information and should be considered a modifiable variable for improving prescription label reading ability amenable by appropriate eye care and spectacle correction.
目的:描述视力,点大小,和处方标签的可读性,并提供与处方标签可读性相关的人口统计学因素的见解。
方法:老年人对处方标签可读性的横断面检查,社区居住的成年人。对受试者进行了人口统计学评估,视敏度,以及能够读取由社区药房分发的五种药物和两种药物样本的未改变的处方标签特征组成的测试仪器。描述性统计与logit预测模型结合用于数据分析。
结果:药物使用说明最容易辨认,95.60%的研究队列确定和正确阅读,而使用药物样本的指导最低(34.91%).在处方标签功能中,辅助标签始终表现出较差的可读性。视敏度水平在统计学上与阅读处方标签的能力相关,同时识别处方标签成分随点大小成比例增加。种族,性别,和最近的眼科检查史是处方标签阅读能力的统计学显著预测因素。仅视敏度被发现解释了阅读Rx标记的能力的大约26%的变异性。
结论:视敏度可预测获取Rx标签信息的能力,应被视为可修改的变量,可通过适当的眼部护理和眼镜矫正来提高处方标签阅读能力。