Measurement of Hospital Pharmacy Workload, Required Full-time Equivalent Staffing and Productivity Using a Web Application: A Case Study of a Hospital in Samut Sakhon Province

Abstract

Objective:1) To develop a web application aligned with pharmacy workflows, capable of recording and displaying individual workload data in dispensing services; and 2) To compare workload, required full-time equivalent (FTE) staffing, and productivity between the current method (based on the number of prescriptions) and the new method (based on the number of medication items) using the developed web application. Methods: This evaluative study was conducted in the pharmacy department of a private hospital in Samut Sakhon province. Data were collected from 70 personnel during December 1–31, 2025. The web application was developed using PHP, HTML, CSS, and JavaScript, with a MySQL database. The system supports workload recording according to actual workflows of dispensing sub-units. Comparative analyses of workload, required FTE staffing, and productivity between the current method and the web application-based method were performed using a paired sample t-test at a significance level of 0.05. Agreement between methods was further assessed using the Bland–Altman plots. Results: The developed web application was able to record workload data according to real-world pharmacy processes, including entry of medication data, labeling printing, drug preparation, pharmacists’ verification of drugs, medication dispensing, and drug returns. The system provides real-time visualization through a dashboard with classification based on dispensing unit and individual staff. The new method yielded significantly higher means for workload (160.25 hours), required FTE staffing (20.26 FTEs), and productivity (62.46%) compared with those from the current method (151.14 hours, 19.06 persons, and 58.92%, respectively) (P<0.001). Bland–Altman analysis showed that 96.77–100.00% of observations fell within the limits of agreement. Conclusion: The developed web application could systematically serve as a tool for workforce management in hospital pharmacy. The system can summarize workload across all processes in dispensing pharmacy service. Calculating workload based on the number of medication items may better reflect workload, staffing levels, and staffing requirements in the pharmacy department.