Drug information centre--analysis of activities of a regional centre.

Description and evaluation of a drug information centre's (DIC) professional activities one year after establishment are summarized. The aims of the centre are: to evaluate which problem areas are frequently requested, how frequently and by whom; which information sources are the most appropriate for the service and the approximate cost of such a service. We received 80 questions during the first 8 months. The questions were mainly asked by hospital physicians (32.5%) and pharmacists (32.5%), other health-care professionals were a minority; the scopes of most frequently asked questions include general properties of active substances (12.2%), contents of particular preparations (21%), dosage (11%), side effects (21%) and indications/contraindications (15%). Cost of the service included variable (mainly phone and mail charges, copy and print of the documents) and fixed costs (cost of software and salary of the staff).