Incorporating age-related special populations into a pharmacy skills laboratory course sequence.

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE: The purpose was this study was to evaluate the incorporation of geriatric and pediatric therapeutic concepts into a pharmacy skills laboratory (PSL) course sequence. Secondary outcomes were to describe the incorporation and evaluate the assessment effectiveness of these topics. Educational activity and setting Teaching materials and assessment data from the PSL course were evaluated for inclusion of content regarding age-related special populations.

FINDINGS: Materials reviewed from 205 PSL sessions held over four years demonstrated 89 (41.5%) sessions incorporated age-related topics using a variety of methods. Quiz and exam item performance was acceptable with an average difficulty index of 77.2% ± 21.3 and 85.8% ± 12.8, respectively. The average objective structured clinical exam (OSCE) score was also satisfactory at 83.2% ± 3.

DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSIONS: Age-related topics were included in several PSL sessions. These incorporation strategies were deemed to be effective as students performed well on written assessments and OSCEs. Additional PSL sessions were identified as potential targets for incorporating age-related special populations into future PSL offerings.