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Background and Purpose: Learning communities in the form of student-faculty families in pharmacy education provide a structure to foster community and inclusion. The purpose of this work is to describe how a new Pharmacy Family (PF) program was implemented and to evaluate the impact on students., Educational Activity and Setting: Our PF program was developed with the goals of building community, promoting a sense of belonging, providing students with opportunities to share and receive advice, and providing a venue for surveillance of student concerns. Each family was comprised of one to two faculty/instructor leaders and three to four doctor of pharmacy students from each cohort and met longitudinally over the course of the academic year. Quantitative and qualitative survey data were collected to assess student perceptions and program satisfaction., Findings: A total of 233 students (66.2%) completed the survey and the majority (66%) were satisfied with the program. Thematic analysis of open-ended questions revealed four themes that contributed to students' satisfaction ratings: meeting content, relationships, atmosphere, and timing. Students with high satisfaction frequently noted that the program fostered connections, mentoring opportunities, and a safe space to share concerns. Students that were neutral or dissatisfied frequently commented on the timing of meetings and inability to form deeper connections., Summary: Student-faculty families can be implemented to improve community and engagement within pharmacy education. Our program was most successful in providing a venue for students to share concerns. Addressing meeting times and adjusting the structure to promote community building is warranted to achieve program goals., Competing Interests: Declaration of Competing Interest None., (Copyright © 2023 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Introduction: Effective patient assessment is often supported through simulated experiences where students identify potential drug-related problems (DRPs) through evaluation of the patient's electronic health record and verbally present their assessment and proposed resolutions for DRPs. This research aimed to initiate validation of a Patient Presentation to a Pharmacy Preceptor (4P) tool using exploratory factor analysis (EFA) to examine underlying constructs, refine items, and improve tool conciseness. The 4P tool was designed to assess student self-efficacy to identify, assess, resolve, and verbally present DRPs to a pharmacy preceptor., Methods: The 4P instrument was administered to third-year doctor of pharmacy students in a performance-based skills laboratory course. EFA was conducted on student confidence data to examine underlying 4P constructs and improve survey conciseness. Laboratory faculty evaluated EFA results and came to consensus on factor extraction, item reduction and revision, and a finalized version of the 4P tool., Results: Faculty interpretation of EFA results suggested elimination of two constructs resulting in a four-factor solution. Item evaluation further led to renaming the four constructs based on underlying factor themes. Out of the original 34-item tool, 13 items were eliminated, eight items were revised, and 1 new item was generated to retain relevant concepts. The refined 4P instrument contained four factors and 22 items., Conclusions: Use of EFA was useful to determine core 4P tool constructs and improved tool conciseness. This final four-factor model including 22 items will be used for a future confirmatory factor analysis., Competing Interests: Declaration of Competing Interest None., (Copyright © 2023 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Flow cytometry methods used to measure leukocyte function often entail sample preparation procedures that cause artifactual cell activation. To avoid leukocyte activation by isolation techniques, some preparation methods use fluorescent markers to discriminate leukocytes from erythrocytes in whole blood. One of these markers, laser dye styryl-751(LDS-751), has been used to distinguish leukocytes by staining nucleic acid, but has been found to stain other blood cells and dead cells indiscriminately. Thus, LDS-751 may not be an appropriate reagent for leukocyte identification in whole blood. Fixing samples with formaldehydes increases cell permeability and causes surface protein cross-linking that may alter staining of both intra- and extracellular markers. The degree of this sample alteration by formaldehyde fixation, however, remains in question. In addition, little is known about flow cytometry and sample preparation methods in mouse whole blood. The purpose of this study was to determine if labeling leukocytes with a monoclonal antibody specific to leukocyte common antigen (CD45) was superior to labeling with LDS-751 and to determine the effect of sample fixation on a mouse whole blood preparation for flow cytometry. Samples were incubated with CD16/CD32 Fc receptor blocker, and either 10 microg/ml LDS-751 or phosphate buffered saline (PBS). The samples were then fixed with paraformaldehyde or diluted with PBS followed by incubation with 5 microg/ml PerCP-conjugated anti-CD45, 5 microg/ml FITC-conjugated anti-CD11b, or 80 microM dichlorofluorescein diacetate. We found that samples labeled with LDS-751 demonstrated decreased fluorescence intensity for granulocyte CD11b expression and ROS production compared to samples labeled with anti-CD45. In addition, sample fixation decreased mean fluorescence intensity in samples labeled with either LDS-751 or anti-CD45. We conclude that labeling leukocytes with monoclonal antibody CD45 in a mouse whole blood preparation is preferable, as it provides improved measurement of leukocyte indices compared to LDS-751. Also, while sample fixation prior to antibody staining caused a decrease in overall fluorescence; it can be used to successfully identify extra-cellular markers.