Evaluation of student performance in an immunization continuing education certificate program incorpated in a pharmacy curriculum

American Journal of Pharmaceutical Education, Summer 2000 by Hak, Emily B, Foster, Stephan L, McColl, Maureen P, Bradberry, J Christopher

Evaluations were favorable and similar between the second- and third-year classes. More than 95 percent felt the program increased their knowledge and almost 90 percent were satisfied with the program. More than 85 percent of students felt that this would be useful to their practice. In the fall of 1998, 66 of the 194 (34 percent) students who completed the program administered 1,250 doses of vaccine during the campus immunization drive. Similarly, in 1999 about one third of eligible students participated and these students immunized 1,248 individuals. No needlestick injuries occurred during the immunization technique laboratories or during either of these two campus influenza immunization programs conducted to date.

DISCUSSION

One of the primary reasons that individuals fail to be adequately immunized directly relates to health professionals who have incomplete or inadequate knowledge of vaccines and their schedules, indications, adverse effects, and contraindications(l). It is critical that health care professionals receive the appropriate education and training regarding immunizations. The APhA Pharmacy-based Immunization Delivery Certificate Program is limited in the number of pharmacists that can be certified since the number of course offerings annually is small and the course is expensive for individual pharmacists. Therefore the ability of this program to increase the number of pharmacist immunizers is modest. To most efficiently expand the role of pharmacists as immunizers, appropriate knowledge and training must be included in the college curricula(2). Further, it is the obligation of colleges to respond to the changes in pharmacy practice laws that broaden the pharmacists' scope of practice by changing the college curricula so that students graduate with all the knowledge and skills needed to practice to the full extent of the law.

In colleges of pharmacy, much of the immunization information provided to students is presented in lecture format(2). Similarly, in medical school and residency programs, lecture is the most common method of teaching the subject matter and only 14 percent of schools use case studies to teach vaccinepreventable disease(3). However, the use of the pedagogical style of teaching has been challenged and the need to learn how to direct one's self to learn has been proposed as an efficacious approach to medical education(4,5) and to promote life long learning. More innovative teaching methods include casebased format, problem based learning, and multi-station clinical scenario formats. These techniques are being used by the Centers for Diseases Control and the Association of Teachers of Preventative Medicine to enhance the presentation of immunization content in medical education(4). Consistent with this philosophy, we chose to present much of the course content in a case-based format.

All students passed the self study test and the final examination; however, the pre-test scores improved with each advancing class. For the final examination, the fourth-year students scored better than the second- and third-year students. This may reflect the additional clinical training of the students in the third and fourth-years of the curriculum. Notably, the students in the fourth-year class chose to take the program, thus their level of interest and enthusiasm for the course may have been greater than that in the second- and third-year students where it was a requirement. All three classes averaged in the mid 90's for both the self study test and the final examination.