Objectives The purpose of this study was to assess the use, predictors and patient's seeking behaviour of complementary and alternative medicines (CAM) in hypertension and evaluate patient's perception of CAM adverse effects. Methods A cross‐sectional questionnaire‐based study was conducted among hypertensive patients from May to December 2015. A convenience sample technique was adopted to recruit patients attending two major teaching hospitals in the capital city Baghdad, Iraq. A total of 400 valid responses were obtained recording a response rate of 93.02%. Key findings The overall prevalence of CAM usage was 65.5% (n = 262). Biological‐based therapies were the most used type of CAM by 62.8% (n = 251) of patients. The use of CAM was associated with patient's educational level, marital status and duration of hypertension. The main reasons of using CAM were to support the standard treatment, decrease the symptoms of hypertension and protect the health. Monthly expenditure on CAM varied from Income in Iraqi Dinar (IQD) 10 000 to IQD 150 000 (US $8.6 to US $128.7). Users of CAM reported some unwanted effects that were associated with a certain category of it. Conclusions The use of CAM, particularly biological‐based therapies, was prevalent among hypertensive patients in Iraq. This practice was associated with patients' educational level, marital status and duration of hypertension. Patient's perception of adverse effects was noticed with different modalities of CAM. Therefore, CAM practice should be suggested only if its benefit is proven, and the side effect is controlled.

There are a few studies that discuss the medical causes for diabetic foot (DF) ulcerations in Iraq, one of them in Wasit province. The aim of our study was to analyze the medical, therapeutic, and patient risk factors for developing DF ulcerations among diabetic patients in Baghdad, Iraq.

Background:The self-treatment with complementary and alternative medicines (CAMs) in chronic diseases is portraying an expanding trend worldwide. Yet, little is known concerning patients’ motives to use CAM in the control of blood pressure.Objective:This study aims to explore the self-use of CAM in the management of hypertension and explore patients’ attitudes, perceived benefits, and disclosure to the physician.Materials and Methods:A qualitative technique was adopted and face-to-face interviews, using a validated interview guide, were carried out among twenty hypertensive patients. A purposive sampling method was used to recruit patients at Al-Karama Teaching Hospital in Baghdad; the capital of Iraq; from January to April 2015. All the interviews were audio-recorded, then transcribed verbatim and examined for thematic relationships.Results:Three major themes were identified through thematic content analysis of the interviews. These encompassed patients’ understanding of CAM; experience and perceived benefits; and communication with the doctors. The use of CAM was prevalent among the majority of the respondents. The most commonly used therapies were biological-based practices (herbal remedies, special diet, vitamins, and dietary supplements); traditional therapies (Al-Hijama or cupping); and to a less extent of manipulative body-based therapies (reflexology). Factors influencing the use of CAM were traditions, social relationships, religious beliefs, low-cost therapy, and safety of natural products.Conclusion:The use of CAM was common as a practice of self-treatment among hypertensive patients in Iraq. This was underpinned by the cultural effects, social relationships, religious beliefs, and the perception that natural products are effective and safe. Understanding patients’ usage of CAM is of great importance as long as patient's safety and interaction with the standard prescribed treatment are major concerns.

Objectives Antibiotic usage has evolved over the years among the Arab population, and it has also gone under misuse resulting in the development of antimicrobial resistance (AMR). Therefore, the current study aimed to address this issue by evaluating the level of knowledge and attitude of Arab population towards antibiotic usage and AMR to develop a pathway to reduce the risk of antibiotic resistance. Methods A cross-sectional study was carried out among Arab population, including 11 countries from the Middle East and North Africa. A validated and translated questionnaire, consisting of 34 questions, was adopted to achieve the study objectives. Two phases of data collection (online and offline) were performed, and SPSS was used for data analysis. Key findings Three thousand three hundred and nineteen participants were successfully recruited, and the mean age was 37.6 ± 11.73. Approximately 63% of participants wrongly answered they should stop antibiotics when they feel better, and 73.3% of them thought antibiotics could treat cold and flu. Nearly half of the respondents indicated that they were uncertain of how antibiotic resistance affects the body (48.1%), and they were unaware if it could affect them or their families (63.1%). While the majority of the respondents were prescribed antibiotics by a doctor, over half of them were not given any advice on how to take them. Our data showed a significant relationship between respondents’ demographic data (e.g. country, age and education) and their knowledge and attitude. Conclusions Participants had poor knowledge of antibiotics and AMR; thus, efforts are needed to conduct health campaigns in public places and create and implement programmes aiming to raise knowledge and awareness of people in the Arab regions. These could aid to curb the risk of antibiotic resistance and increase the chance of successful treatment for infectious diseases.

Background: The use of cosmetic products is growing in dominance in the Arab population, making it essential to measure its effects on users. The production of cosmetics has been largely driven by consumerism and a bid to keep abreast with the latest trends in the beauty industry with less attention on how the users' quality of life (QoL) is affected.Aims: This study aims to investigate the effect of cosmetic products on users' quality of life in eight Arab countries. Methods:A cross-sectional study was carried out using an online data collection approach. A validated and specialist instrument tool called BeautyQoL, which consists of five domains and a total of 52 questions, was distributed to a sample of 2219 cosmetic users. Descriptive and inferential statistical analysis was done using SPSS® version 26.0.

The recent infection by the COVID-19 virus has rapidly become a major health concern, both in terms of its strong impact on the health system, and economical burden. Assessment of pharmacy students' level of awareness, attitude, and knowledge about the recent COVID-19 infection in Iraq. A population-based cross-sectional study that involved pharmacy college students across the country, this study used an electronic-based questionnaire that was delivered to each of the participants online. The study included 907 pharmacy students, with 609 females (67.1%) and 298 males (32.9%), a ratio of 2:1. The fifth grade represented the majority, with 275 students (30.3%). Overall, 81.1% of all students knew about COVID-19 infection before the outbreak (which was similar across all grades, p-value = 0.160), the most common source of information was social medical (52%, followed by the WHO website (25.8%), in which the lower grades depended less on the WHO website. Most of the students (61%) believed 1-2months ago that the COVID-19 infection was circulating in Iraq, while 29.2% only started to believe it within the previous 2 weeks. In terms of preventive measures, 89.1% believe that adhering to guidelines can prevent infection, 86.0% believe that infection control in hospitals can prevent transmission. Pharmacy students show a high level of awareness in terms of the medical aspect of the disease, good knowledge in the science about the virus. The students have a negative impression of the role of institutes towards the prevention of the spread of the infection.

With the increasing prevalence of breast cancer among female internationally, occupies about 25% of all cases of cancer, with a measured 1.57 million up to date cases in 2012. Breast cancer has turn a most warning to health of female in Iraq, where it is the major cause of death among women after cardiovascular diseases, with a mortality rate of 23% related cancer. Recently there is a crucial requirement to include community pharmacists in health elevation activities to support awareness and early diagnosis of cancer, specially breast cancer. The aim of this study is to assess knowledge, attitude and perceived barriers amongst Iraqi community pharmacists towards health promotion of breast cancer. This study is cross sectional research. A questionnaire was given to pharmacists. The questionnaire comprised from four parts: community pharmacist’s demographics and description of practice; knowledge of signs, symptoms and risk causes; knowledge around breast cancer screening and perceived barriers.300 questionnaires were finished and returned by Iraqi community pharmacists. Mean score of knowledge and screening of breast cancer was 7.9 ± 1.86 and 1.69± 0.33 points respectively, categorizing the overall knowledge and screening of breast cancer among participants as poor level, while mean score for pharmacist attitude was 26.44± 3.86   points, categorizing the overall attitude as favorable. Lack of time was perceived by a great proportion of pharmacists (68.2%) as a major barrier to providing patient education.

This study was designed to investing the drug prescribing pattern which is the important point in the rational or irrational use of drugs among patients dispensing their prescriptions from the private pharmacies in Maysan governorate, Iraq for a period of 1 month. The data collected from prescriptions were calculated and analyzed according to the WHO prescribing guidelines. The data showed that the mean of drugs included in single prescription was 3.4, and 12% of prescribed drugs were written as generic names; moreover, the percentage of antibiotics, corticosteroids and anxiolytics were 33.3%, 11.4% and 23.8% respectively. Those results indicate the irrational use of drugs when compared with the world health organization standard values of prescribing indicators, in addition to the bad prescribing pattern regardless of the degree of specialization of the physician, where 52% of those prescriptions (analyzed in the present study) written by specialized physicians. In conclusion, actual intervention and follow up, training on rational use of drugs and intervention strategies for prescribers is required to improve the rational use of drugs. Key words: prescription pattern, polypharmacy, rational drug use