title: Performance of health product risk management and surveillance conducted by health personnel at sub-district health promotion hospitals in the northeast region of Thailand.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Health personnel at sub-district health promotion hospitals (SD-HPHs) are assigned to take responsibility for 15 activities related to health product risk management and surveillance (HP-RM&S). This cross-sectional survey aimed to identify factors that determined their job performance and to record their expressed needs to support HP-RM&S operation. In this study, job performance was defined as completion of all 15 activities.
  
  
  METHODS
  Self-administered postal questionnaires were used to collect data from 380 randomly selected health personnel who were in charge of HP-RM&S at SD-HPHs in the northeast of Thailand.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Thirty-six point one percent (n=137) of the respondents were able to perform all 15 of the HP-RM&S activities assigned to SD-HPHs. A logistic regression model identified three factors that statistically significantly determined the completion of all 15 HP-RM&S activities. These were: receiving a high or very high level of support from the community (adjusted odds ratio [OR]: 2.5; 95% confidence interval [CI]: 1.5, 4.1), the responsible persons for HP-RM&S did not hold an administrative position (adjusted OR: 1.7; 95% CI: 1.1, 2.7), and having at least one training session related to HP-RM&S per year (adjusted OR: 1.7; 95% CI 1.1, 2.6). There were 1,536 expressed needs which can be classified into four major categories, ie, training needs (41.6%, n=639), resource support (28.3%, n=435), mechanisms that facilitate HP-RM&S operation (24.1%, n=370) and adjusting of the scope of HP-RM&S (6.0%, n=92). The topics most frequently referred to in training needs were drug law, food law, and cosmetics law.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  A strategy for improvement of the job performance in HP-RM&S of health personnel in SD-HPHs should target identifying schemes to encourage the community to proactively participate in HP-RM&S. The district health office as the organization directly controlling and supervising SD-HPHs should also regularly update knowledge base and skills necessary for HP-RM&S operation through training of the responsible health personnel.
authors.affiliation: Faculty of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Khon Kaen University, Khon Kaen, Thailand ; Center for Research and Development of Herbal Health Products, Khon Kaen University, Khon Kaen, Thailand.
authors.forename: Tipaporn
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Kanjanarach
authors.affiliation: Faculty of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Khon Kaen University, Khon Kaen, Thailand ; Center for Research and Development of Herbal Health Products, Khon Kaen University, Khon Kaen, Thailand.
authors.forename: Raksaworn
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Jaisa-Ard
authors.affiliation: Health Consumer Protection, Chaiyapum Health Provincial Office, Chaiyapum, Thailand.
authors.forename: Nantawan
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Poonaovarat
keywords: health products; job performances; risk management; sub-district health promotion hospital; surveillance; training need