Assessing public understanding of the policy of separating dispensing and prescribing in Korea: a survey of college students.

We investigated the level of public understanding of the 'separation of dispensing and prescribing' health policy in Korea and its associated factors. A questionnaire survey was conducted upon 700 college students at four months after the introduction of the policy. The understanding level was measured using four question items describing the goal and motivation of the policy, and ten items describing its operational rules. For each item, respondents were asked to mark whether the description was true or false. While the goal and motivation of the policy was relatively well informed (mean understanding score: 69.58 out of 100), people did not have a good understanding of the operational details of the policy (mean score: 32.52). The results of regression analyses showed that personal interest and agreement with the need of the policy were the most significant factors affecting the understanding level (p < 0.01). It is concluded that, for other public policies in the future, policy makers in Korea need to develop more effective media communication strategies to effectively inform the public of the practical details of the policy.