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Objective: To evaluate the impact of an emergency department simulation on pharmacy students' interprofessional team skills and attitudes as measured by a novel mixed methods approach. Methods: A simulated emergency department encounter was executed by interprofessional teams consisting of pharmacy and medical students. Two rounds of the same encounter were separated by a short debriefing session facilitated by pharmacy and medical faculty. A full, comprehensive debriefing session occurred after conclusion of the second round. Pharmacy faculty evaluated pharmacy students using a competency-based checklist after each round of the simulation. Pharmacy students completed a baseline self-assessment of their interprofessional skills and attitudes pre-simulation, and again post-simulation. Results: Pharmacy students demonstrated significant improvement in providing clear and concise verbal interprofessional communication and using shared decision making to develop a collaborative plan of care, based upon student self-assessment and faculty observational ratings. Student self-assessments also showed significant perceived growth in contributing to the team's plan of care, and demonstrating active listening skills within the interprofessional team. Through qualitative analysis, pharmacy students noted perceived self-improvement in a variety of team-based skills and attitudes including confidence, critical thinking, role identification, communication, and self-awareness. Conclusion: This simulation provided a learning opportunity for pharmacy students to improve their skills related to teamwork and interprofessional collaboration. Based upon a novel a mixed methods assessment, both student self-assessment and faculty observational ratings were associated with significant growth in interprofessional skills and attitudes. This simulation provides a template experience for colleges/schools to meet, at least in part, ACPE Standards related to interprofessional education in collaboration with medical students.
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INTRODUCTION: A novel continuing professional education CPE training program and simulation were used to teach pharmacists and pharmacy technicians about continuous quality improvement and how to identify, report, and communicate information regarding medication related errors using root cause analysis. METHODS: Pharmacists and pharmacy technicians attending a statewide pharmacy association meeting voluntary attended a CPE training program and simulation. During the simulation, learners investigated and identified medication related errors in three different pharmacy settings. A collection of items found at each pharmacy and audio recordings were used by learners to identify the medication related error. After each simulation, facilitators led a debriefing to discuss the learners' experiences. Data was collected using online surveys. Descriptive statistics and chi-square tests were used to analyze the data. RESULTS: Fourteen months following the program, 15 of the 67 participants responded to an anonymous survey. Of the 15 responding participants, 73.3% (11/15) were confident or very confident they could establish or maintain a high-quality continuous quality improvement plan at their practice site. Sixty percent (9/15) felt the experience reinforced their current practices, 13.3% (2/15) had implemented changes to their practice, and 13.3% (2/15) felt they needed more information before considering changes to their practice. Reported barriers to establishing a continuous quality improvement program were time constraints, 40.0% (6/15), system constraints, 26.7% (4/15), or lack of staff 20.0% (3/15). CONCLUSION: A CPE training program and simulation reinforced practice for pharmacy personnel, resulted in changes to practice, and positively increased participants' confidence in establishing a continuous quality improvement plan in the workplace.
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BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE: The opioid crisis in the United States is widespread and requires large scale efforts to reduce the problem. A recent call by the American Association of Colleges of Pharmacy requested commitments by member schools to enact curricular changes in order to prepare pharmacy graduates to be impactful in addressing the opioid crisis. EDUCATIONAL ACTIVITY: A taskforce reviewed existing pain management and opioid-related curricular content in the North Dakota State University School of Pharmacy (NDSU SOP). As a result, all pre-existing opioid-related content was maintained and six new educational activities were designed and implemented to enhance hands-on experience and application of pain management and opioid-related concepts and skills. Students were surveyed after completing the pre-APPE curriculum regarding their confidence in identifying inappropriate use of opioids and engaging in conversations with patients about safe opioid use. FINDINGS: The full longitudinal approach to addressing pain management and opioid content in the North Dakota State University School of Pharmacy program is described. Curricular gap analysis, thoughtful coordination, faculty collaboration, and curriculum mapping were required in order to bring the full pain management and opioid curricular plan to fruition. The vast majority of students were confident in their ability to counsel patients on appropriate options for safe use and disposal of opioids (96%) and their ability to determine if a patient is at risk for opioid misuse (92%). A lower percentage (71%) were confident in their ability to converse with patients regarding opioid misuse concerns. SUMMARY: This is the first report to summarize a longitudinal, curriculum-wide approach taken to address the opioid crisis in the United States and in response to AACP's call to action for pharmacy schools. This description may be valuable to other pharmacy and health professions educational programs in search of means to implement and/or enhance their current curricular offerings related to pain management and opioids.