An Assessment of the Effects of Communication Network in Curbing Unethical Marketing Practices of Drug Firms in Nigeria

The study assessed the effects of communication network between stakeholders in curbing unethical marketing practices of drug firms operating in the South Eastern States of Nigeria. The study was a survey design and adopted stratified, simple random, convenience and judgmental sampling techniques. One hypothesis and a research question guided the study. The target population was 5621, involving 3444 healthcare professionals, (doctors, pharmacists, nurses),390 licensed drug firms, 1641 drug consumers and 146 senior staff of the regulatory agencies in Abia, Anambra, Ebonyi, Enugu and Imo States. The sample size was 985. Five University Teaching Hospitals constituted the study centres.Primary and secondary sources of data were accessed. Opinions of experts were used in the questionnaire validation. The scores derived from the pilot study were subjected to Cronbach’s Alpha technique. A reliability co-efficient of 0.984 was estimated. The research question was answered. Using one-way ANOVA statistical technique and Minitab software package, the hypothesis was tested at 0.05 level of significance and 15 degrees of freedom. The study revealed that the effectiveness of the communication network between the stakeholders was zero percent and therefore nonsignificant for effective dissemination of information about the unethical marketing practices of drug firms. Recommendations were made..