The effectiveness of community-based interprofessional education for undergraduate medical and health promotion students.

BACKGROUND: Community-based interprofessional education (CBIPE) has been proven effective in enhancing the interprofessional competencies of medical and health professional students. However, there is a lack of evaluation on the impact of experiential CBIPE among undergraduate medical and health promotion students in Thailand. Therefore, the objective of this study is to assess the influence of CBIPE learning on the collaborative competencies of these students. METHODS: A one-group pre-posttest design in 193 (152 medical students and 41 health promotion) students were involved in the CBIPE program, later divided into 12 groups. Data was collected by direct observations of mentors using the Interprofessional Collaborative Competencies Attainment Survey (ICCAS). The Wilcoxon matched-pairs signed-rank test was conducted to evaluate the effectiveness of the CBIPE program. RESULTS: A total of 175 (90.67%) completed ICCAS and satisfaction questions before and after the CBIPE program. The mean age of respondents was 20.29 ± 1.63 years; 60.57% were women and 39.43% were men. The results showed a significant increase in collaborative competencies before and after the 2-week course. Gender-stratified analysis showed an improvement after CBIPE training for all subscales in women, while the communication, collaboration, conflict management, and functioning team skills segment score was significantly higher in the post-assessment among men. CONCLUSION: The implementation of CBIPE learning was successful in enhancing collaborative competencies among both medical and health promotion students. These findings will provide valuable insights for the design and improvement of CBIPE learning programs in other universities.

Factors Associated with Demand for Medical Cannabis Use among Breast Cancer Patients in Northern Thailand: A Cross-Sectional Study.

OBJECTIVE: Breast cancer is the leading cause of death among women worldwide. Although modern treatments are recognized as effective, they often cause side effects. In Thailand, medical cannabis (MC) was legalized in 2019 with limited research on demand for its use. Therefore, this study aimed to identify factors associated with demand for MC among breast cancer patients in the North of Thailand as a target group. METHODS: This cross-sectional analytical study administered multistage random sampling to recruit 432 breast cancer patients in northern Thailand. Ethical approval and signed written informed consents were obtained from the patients, prior to the study. A standardized, self-administered structured questionnaire was used to obtain the sociodemographic characteristics, clinical characteristics, social support, attitudes toward MC, knowledge about MC, health literacy about MC, and questions on demand for MC use. The scores from all questionnaires were converted to percentages before analysis. RESULT: A total of 173 (40%) of patients with breast cancer reported demand to use MC. The factors that were significantly associated with demand to use MC included had high levels of health literacy about MC (adj.OR = 4.96; 95% CI: 2.77 to 8.87), higher levels of social support (adj.OR =4.56; 95% CI: 2.20 to 9.42), higher monthly household income (adj.OR =4.02; 95% CI: 2.33 to 6.94), and positive attitudes toward MC use (adj.OR = 3.52; 95% CI: 1.91 to 6.52) when controlling for effects of other covariates. CONCLUSION: We found substantial demand for MC use among breast cancer patients. Health literacy, social support, monthly household income, and attitudes about MC were significantly associated with demand for MC use. Therefore, improving health literacy, social support, and attitudes about MC, especially among breast cancer patients, could help increase demand for MC as a complementary and alternative medicine alongside cancer treatment.