Prescription of medicines in family health strategy: nurses’ perception

Abstract

Aim: to know nurses ' perception about medicine prescription in Family Health Strategy in a city in the State of Maranhão. Method: qualitative and descriptive study, in which eight Nurses were interviewed. Data were collected in April 2014 through interviews and analyzed according to the content analysis method. Results: it was noted that the interviewed nurses were recently hired young women that had been graduated for more than three years. From the interviews, two categories emerged: nurses’ perception on their medicine prescribing and knowledge bases for prescription. It was perceived that nurses see prescription of drugs as an important and necessary role, they argued that the knowledge used to prescribe is from their professional experience rather than their academic formation. Final considerations: thus, the need of undergraduate courses to properly prepare nurses to perform such function is highlighted.