What Factors Improve the Evaluation of Achievement at the End of Pharmacy Practice Experiences?

Abstract

In the pharmacy practice experience (PPE) component of the pharmaceutical education model core curriculum, factors by which achievement can best be evaluated in rubric format have not been empirically determined. In this study, multivariate analysis was conducted based on characteristic information obtained from PPEs.

Data were analyzed from a total of 146 fifth-year students of Keio University Faculty of Pharmacy who completed PPEs in 2021. Using “Learning Results Prior to PPE”, “Presence / Absence of Role Model in PPE”, “Number of Experience Areas focused on Representative Eight Diseases”, and “Number of People who were Provided Medication Instruction” as the explanatory variables, and “Number of Mentor-provided Performance Evaluations with Scores ≥3” and “Sum of Mentor-provided Performance Evaluation Scores” as the objective variables, multiple regression analysis was performed. For “Number of Mentor-provided Performance Evaluations with Scores ≥3” predictions in training at a pharmacy, training at a hospital, or both, the respective probability values were <0.001, 0.189, and 0.012. For “Sum of Mentor-provided Performance Evaluation Scores”, the respective probability values were 0.005, 0.046, and 0.048. The effect of “Number of Experience Areas focused on Representative Eight Diseases” on each objective variable was consistently large.

Multivariate analysis using PPE-relevant collected information identified factors that improve the evaluation of achievement at the end of a PPE.