Evaluation of pharmaceuticals inventory management in selected public health facilities of west arsi zone, oromia regional state, Ethiopia

Abstract

Background: Effective inventory management ensures uninterrupted supply of safe, effective and affordable pharmaceuticals which could be achieved through developing ABC-VEN and FSN-XYZ matrix analysis. Objective: To evaluate inventory management and assess knowledge and practice of conducting inventory analysis in selected public health facilities of West Arsi zone, Oromia regional state for the year 2016-2018. Method: Facility-based cross sectional descriptive study complemented with qualitative study was conducted in fourteen health facilities. Data were collected from goods issuing voucher for the year 2016-2018 to perform ABC-VEN matrix analysis. Frequency of issue was collected to perform FSN analysis and the value of each closing stock was taken to get XYZ analysis. Moreover, self administered questioners and interview guide were used to assess pharmacists’ knowledge and practices of inventory matrix analysis. Result: From ABC-VEN matrix analysis, majority of items were category I of which its highest proportion were in class A and V items. Based on FSN-XYZ matrix analysis findings, XF utilized the highest budget (56.8%) in 2016 and (44.7%) in 2017. However, XN group had the highest value 41.3%.Percentage based on the level of knowledge of pharmacy professionals about purpose of inventory management system indicated 30% as good, 55% as average and 15 % as poor knowledge rank. Conclusion: Public health facilities should identify those inventories which needs top priority for close monitoring. Items under class A, V, F and X require attention either for having high values or for their criticality in clinical importance. Yet, those items under group XN would rather be transported to other facilities to be utilized timely. On the other hand, most of the professionals have a knowledge gap on performing different inventory matrix analysis. Thus, PHFs should arrange to provide training on FSN and XYZ analysis in addition to ABC-VEN matrix analysis.