Knowledge and perceptions of physicians from private medical centres towards generic medicines: a nationwide survey from Malaysia

Table 5 Comparison between demographic characteristic and doctors’ perceptions about issues pertaining to generic medicines utilization

Item description	Gender*	Age**	Year of graduation**	Postgraduate qualification*	Country of graduation**	Year of practice**	No. of prescriptions written/day**	% of generics in stock**
I believe, we need a standard guideline to both prescribers and pharmacist on brand substitution process.	0.298	0.112	0.254	0.296	0.002	0.178	0.425	0.446
In my opinion, quality use of generics among patients can be achieved if both prescribers and pharmacist work together.	0.071	0.255	0.392	0.024	0.126	0.110	0.407	0.560
I think, patient should be given enough information about generic medicines in order to make sure they really understand about the medicines they take.	0.022	< 0.001 ^a	< 0.001	0.612	0.775	< 0.001 ^a	0.083	0.189
I believe advertisement by the drug companies will influence my future prescribing pattern.	0.072	0.315	0.021 ^a	0.289	0.726	0.026	0.765	0.045
I need more information on the issues pertaining to the safety and efficacy of generic medicines.	0.005	0.007 ^a	0.119	0.781	0.255	0.059	0.981	0.093
Budget for drug procurement will affect my choice of medicines.	0.010	0.008 ^a	< 0.001 ^a	0.034	0.302	0.003 ^a	1.000	0.052

*Mann Whitney test.
**Kruskal Wallis test was used.
P < 0.05 is considered significant.
^aSignificant after Bonferroni correction. Bold values indicate statistical significance.

ISSN: 2052-3211