Grasping pharmacy students consider important when attending cancer patients in chemotherapy with a text mining analysis method

Abstract

The text mining analysis method is often used in pharmaceutical education qualitative research to draw out words that characterize a key point or idea. There were no reports in Japanese on how pharmacy students practice pharmaceutical management and what they felt was important during their practical training using this method. This study used text mining to examine the trends among students who had charge of patients receiving cancer chemotherapy. The results indicated that many students responded with the words “side effects” in association with treatment in pharmaceutical management goals. During the practical training, they placed the most importance on “thinking” about the patient. Also, treatment “objectives” and “goals” were characteristic words from the students who had the charge of patients expected to recover. On the other hand, “QOL” was a distinct word from students in charge of patients receiving life extension and symptomatic relief treatments. It was concluded through the text mining analysis that students developed and expanded perspectives during their training to assist patients with treatment goals, treatment outcomes, and side effects.