Pharmacy (Sep 2015)

Does the Subject Content of the Pharmacy Degree Course Influence the Community Pharmacist’s Views on Competencies for Practice?

  • Jeffrey Atkinson,
  • Kristien De Paepe,
  • Antonio Sánchez Pozo,
  • Dimitrios Rekkas,
  • Daisy Volmer,
  • Jouni Hirvonen,
  • Borut Bozic,
  • Agnieska Skowron,
  • Constantin Mircioiu,
  • Annie Marcincal,
  • Andries Koster,
  • Keith Wilson,
  • Chris van Schravendijk,
  • Jamie Wilkinson

DOI
https://doi.org/10.3390/pharmacy3030137
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 3, no. 3
pp. 137 – 153

Abstract

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Do community pharmacists coming from different educational backgrounds rank the importance of competences for practice differently—or is the way in which they see their profession more influenced by practice than university education? A survey was carried out on 68 competences for pharmacy practice in seven countries with different pharmacy education systems in terms of the relative importance of the subject areas chemical and medicinal sciences. Community pharmacists were asked to rank the competences in terms of relative importance for practice; competences were divided into personal and patient-care competences. The ranking was very similar in the seven countries suggesting that evaluation of competences for practice is based more on professional experience than on prior university education. There were some differences for instance in research-related competences and these may be influenced, by education.

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