Impact assessment of pharmacy awareness campaigns conducted in selected high schools across Lagos, Nigeria

Abstract

Background: It is revealing that pharmacy as a key health care profession is almost invisible within more recent health policy initiatives in Nigeria. This research is an effort to improve awareness about the pharmacy profession. The target shall be young, science inclined individuals in high schools; they are the future. Objective: To assess the levels of knowledge of high school science students about pharmacy and their interest in becoming pharmacists before and after sessions of awareness and education about the profession. Method: The study was a behavioral intervention study with pre and post cross-sectional survey; carried out in three high schools across Lagos, Nigeria; 127 science students participated. Information was collected using questionnaires inquiring into the career interests of the students and their levels of awareness of the pharmacy profession before and after series of coordinated sensitization about pharmacy. There was one sensitization exercise conducted per school and each lasted for about 80 min with breaks in between. An average of 40 students per school (all science majors present on the day of the survey) participated in the study. A pretest was first conducted, followed by the campaign and then a posttest to assess impact. Communication was done in English language all through the survey. Results: and Discussion: Most of the students claimed to know who a pharmacist is. However, upon further probe, only 3.1 percent of the respondents had a very good knowledge of what the pharmacy profession entails, from the pretest. At the end of the awareness discussions, an appreciable 18.1 percent of the students now had very good knowledge of the pharmacy profession. Similarly, a better 11.8 percent of students became interested in becoming pharmacists against the previously recorded 5.5 percent. This depicts how strategic advocacies can be utilized in building good professionals and ensuring a sustainable legacy for pharmacy in Nigeria. Conclusion:The study establishes that the knowledge and awareness of high school science students about the pharmacy profession is relatively low across three selected secondary schools. The sensitization held yielded measurable improvement in awareness and interest. In view of this, Pharmacists in Nigeria are implored to do more of career mentorship.

Assessment of awareness of pharmacy profession as a career among secondary school students in Kaduna state, Nigeria

“…This study's results also revealed that most students had inadequate knowledge of pharmacy practice areas, consistent with previous findings from Lagos (Ghazali et al, 2020). A possible explanation could be the considerable number of students who intend to choose medicine as their preferred choice, the relatively lower number of practising pharmacists in northern Nigeria (Ekpenyong et al, 2018), and the low number of pharmacists compared to other health professionals.…”

“…The proportion of students interested in studying pharmacy was significantly higher than what was reported among secondary school students in Lagos (Ghazali et al, 2020). This result could be due to differences in the level of awareness of careers in pharmacy and the demographic characteristics of the various respondents.…”

“…To achieve this goal, the professional roles of pharmacists had shifted from product-oriented to patient-centred care in the form of pharmaceutical care (Ekpenyong et al, 2018). The pharmacy profession has a wide variety of career opportunities that include traditional practice areas, such as hospital, community, industry, academia, and administrative pharmacy (Ahmed et al, 2016;Kokane & Avhad, 2016) and non-traditional practice areas, such as journalism, public health, veterinary, consultancy, information, and communication technology (Fink, 2005;Ubaka, Ochie, & Adibe, 2013).…”

“…There is a strong relationship between vocational information and career choice (Baloch & Shah, 2014). Indeed, most secondary school students in Nigeria have poor knowledge of pharmacists and the pharmacy profession (Ghazali et al, 2020). Lack of adequate or incorrect career information by students has been described as a primary factor leading to a wrong career decision, which, in most cases, results in an inability to satisfy the requirements of a particular career pathway, stagnation, disappointment, and development of unrealistic expectations (Baloch & Shah, 2014;Wang'eri & Karanja, 2018).…”