Impact of Curricular Integration Between Patient Care Laboratory and Introductory Pharmacy Practice Experience on Documentation

Abstract

Objective. To assess the impact of curricular changes made through vertical integration between Patient Care Laboratory and Introductory Pharmacy Practice Experience (IPPE) courses on documentation outcomes. Methods. Curricular changes to address student pharmacist documentation deficiencies were developed by laboratory and experiential faculty members. A documentation activity using subjective, objective, assessment, plan (SOAP) notes completed in one IPPE rotation block, pre-intervention, were graded and compared to SOAP notes from the same IPPE rotation block in the subsequent year, post-intervention, using a standard checklist. Chi square test (or Fisher exact test when appropriate) was used to evaluate the relationship between each question's score and different timepoints. Wilcoxon rank sum test was used to compare total scores between the two groups of students. Results. Significant improvement among student pharmacists' SOAP note scores were observed in the post-intervention cohort (n552) compared to pre-intervention cohort (n552) following curricular changes. Specific SOAP note components that revealed significant improvements between years were drug therapy problem identified, proposed drug therapy problem resolution, follow-up plan identified, overall impression, and addressing a pharmacist-specific intervention. Conclusion. Collaboration between laboratory and experiential education faculty members are integral to the identification of gaps in student pharmacists' application of simulated activities into actual experiences and in the achievement of educational outcomes. Curricular quality improvements can be implemented and assessed quickly through vertically integrated courses.

Community pharmacy-based SOAP notes documentation

“…[1,4,6,15,26,27] These are mainly popular worldwide as communication tools to facilitate the PCP, pharmacotherapy recommendations, and progress reports on health outcomes. [2,5,18,29–31]…”

Methods for Optimizing Student Pharmacist Learning of Clinical Note Writing

“…Clinical notes were scored using a modified, 25-point checklist based on the American Pharmacist's Association guidelines and adopted from others. 27,35 This modified checklist only evaluated the presence or absence of material in each section, not on relevancy since this required more clinical expertise.…”

“…While this research has shown improvements, there is limited data on the use of explicit instruction in teaching clinical note writing. 27 The purpose of this study is to investigate the role of worked examples or problem-solving practice in the learning and reinforcement of writing a clinical note. Specifically, we will test the worked example-problem-solving (WEPS) paradigm against the worked example-worked example (WEWE) paradigm in writing clinical notes.…”

Utilising a simulated clinical rotation elective to prepare pharmacy students for experiential education

“…Previous studies support the use of simulated electronic health records (EHRs) as a tool to aid in application-based learning (Vyas, Bray, & Wilson, 2013). A study conducted at the University of Kentucky College of Pharmacy documented a significant improvement in student documentation and writing skills through Subjective, Objective, Assessment, Plan (SOAP) notes after the implementation of an EHR platform into a Patient Care Laboratory course (Divine, Jones, & Gokun, 2020). Another qualitative review conducted at Midwestern University, Chicago College of Pharmacy, utilised simulation-based learning to teach cardiovascular topics (Kolanczyk, Borchert, & Lempicki, 2019).…”