Factors that prevent pharmacists from using knowledge of organic chemistry in clinical practice

Abstract

Few pharmacists reportedly utilize their knowledge of organic chemistry in clinical practice, so this study aimed to identify the factors that prevent pharmacists from applying this knowledge. Three authors performed a secondary KJ method on the descriptive labels obtained in two chemical structural formula workshops in 2018. The results generated 16 islands of possible factors, further classified into five groups, that prevented 55 pharmacy students and pharmacists from using the chemical structures in clinical practice. The five groups were named “environmental problems,” “individual problems,” “educational problems,” “lack of social demand,” and “limited data for clinical application of chemical structure formulas.” In conclusion, two main factors were identified: “social demand and environmental external factors” and “individual internal factors attributable to education.” These results provided helpful information for the clinical application of organic chemistry in pharmaceutical education.