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Clinical reasoning is a vital skill for student pharmacists in the provision of patient-centered care, but these skills are often difficult to assess in the didactic curriculum. A script concordance test (SCT) is an innovative assessment method that can be used to assess clinical reasoning skills. The objective of this study was to develop and refine an SCT to assess clinical reasoning skills of third year student pharmacists (P3s).An SCT was written and administered to P3s. Pharmacy practice faculty members served as the expert group. The SCT was scored and Rasch analysis was performed.The SCT included 20 case vignettes and 60 questions. Test reliability was 0.34 with mean square values for all items between 0.7 and 1.3. Forty-two questions had a difficulty score between 0 and - 1 logits, indicating there were multiple questions with similar difficulty levels. Two case vignettes and 43.3% of questions (n = 26) were revised to enhance clarity and decrease ambiguity.The SCT is a tool to assess clinical reasoning in the didactic curriculum. Faculty can create the SCT and use statistical methods such as Rasch analysis to assess validity and reliability of the SCT.

Objectives Tobacco use is the nation's leading cause of preventable illness and death, causing a significant burden on the health care system. Many cessation pharmacotherapy treatment options are available to help smokers quit, including nicotine replacement therapies (NRTs) and prescription medications. Research indicates that pharmacists are able to provide a positive benefit to smokers who want to quit through pharmacologic and nonpharmacologic interventions. The aim of the present work was to examine the quit rates among participants who received smoking cessation pharmacotherapy and pharmacist-provided telephone-based quit counseling services. Design Retrospective database review of enrolled participants. Setting Telephone-based pharmacotherapy and medication counseling services offered from a medication management center. Participants State employees who voluntarily contacted a medication management center for smoking cessation services after receiving promotional flyers. Main outcome measures Long-term quit rates at 7 and 13 months were determined by means of patient self-report in response to questioning. Smoking cessation was considered to be a success if the patient reported not smoking for the past 30 days. Results A total of 238 participants were included in the review. Thirty-nine participants completed the program after the first treatment, 12 participants after the second treatment, and 4 participants after the third treatment. Two patients completed the program more than once. Eighty-five participants (36%) reported results at 7-month follow-up; of these, 43 (51%) were smoking free. A total of 44 participants (18%) reported results at 13-month follow-up; of these, 24 participants (55%) reported being smoking free. There were no significant differences in the percentages of smoking-free participants at 7 or 13 months, regardless of their first treatment ( P = 0.06 and 0.345, respectively). Conclusion Successful quit rates were higher than previously demonstrated with other telephone-based smoking cessation programs. Therefore, pharmacist-provided telephone-based counseling may be beneficial in helping patients to quit smoking. Future research is warranted to examine the benefits of these types of programs.

Objective To assess concept learning and topic difficulty in a concept-based research methods course. Methods A pre–post exam was given to second professional year Doctor of Pharmacy students enrolled at the University of Arizona College of Pharmacy using 25 concept-based multiple choice questions. Rasch analysis was used to determine the change in student ability and to assess question difficulty. Results A total of 94 students completed both pre- and post-tests (response rate = 96.9%). As a group, student ability significantly increased from the pre- to post-test ( p p Conclusions Students learned the material over the semester as indicated by the overall increase in student ability. Changes in question difficulty provide evidence for the importance of practice when learning concepts.

Background The use of social media by students in professional health programs has led to concerns about social networking site (SNS) content, and colleges and universities are deciding whether they should provide guidance for students regarding professional online content. Objective The primary objective was to evaluate the validity of an instrument used to assess student pharmacists’ comfort level and concerns regarding SNS. A secondary objective was to describe students’ perceptions of and concerns about specific SNS behaviors at one college of pharmacy. Methods In 2009, a 24-item questionnaire was distributed to students enrolled at the University of Arizona College of Pharmacy. The first section of the questionnaire (nine questions) asked students to indicate their level of agreement with specific SNS behaviors. The second section (eight questions) requested students to state their level of concern with specific unprofessional SNS behaviors. Rasch analysis was performed to assess reliability and validity. Results A total of 292 students submitted completed questionnaires (74% response rate). Facebook was the primary SNS used. Respondents indicated that they would not send a friend request to or accept a friend request from a faculty member. Students were most concerned about online posting of profanity and least concerned with online posting of unprofessional content affiliated with the pharmacy profession. Conclusions Student pharmacists were uncomfortable networking with faculty or future employers, and their lack of concern with the potential unprofessional online posts could raise some legal and ethical issues for colleges of pharmacy, especially those without a social media policy.

Objectives To review concept theory and to describe a model for using concept theory so as to develop multiple-choice questions that can test more advanced cognitive skills in the area of study design. Theory Concepts are abstract categories containing information about objects, symbols, or events that share specific characteristics. Concepts serve as tools for identifying and categorizing objects, events, or situations, for instance, types of study designs, as examples or non-examples of a category. Application The process for developing questions to test concept learning in study design can be summarized as follows: (1) identify the learning objectives that require concept classification (e.g., use verbs such as identify, differentiate, or compare); (2) identify new case examples (cases not previously encountered by students) of the target concepts (e.g., an abstract for a randomized controlled trial); and (3) use information from the case examples to write multiple-choice questions. The questions use concept names (e.g., independent variable) and specific examples from the case (e.g., blood pressure) in the question stem or as response options. Conclusions By using concepts or specific examples from the case, multiple-choice questions that test concept skills critical to using the literature in clinical practice were developed. Use of a case example new to students assures answers cannot be memorized, and use of coordinate concepts as response options assures all options are viable choices. An advantage of using concept theory is that some questions can be reused with new case examples.

Objective To assess the knowledge and attitudes of Doctor of Pharmacy (PharmD) students regarding geriatric care and training. Methods The survey was administered to first, second, and third professional year PharmD students at a four-year public university during the fall semester of 2011. Groups were differentiated based on completion of a geriatrics-focused course, which is offered annually as a two-credit elective for a maximum of 100 health professional students. Results A total of 193 student pharmacists completed the survey, which resulted in a response rate of 66.55%. The second and third professional year PharmD students who took the geriatrics-focused course showed significantly higher knowledge of geriatric care (mean = 8.46 and 10.12, respectively) compared to their peers who did not take the course (mean = 7.45, p = 0.03; and mean=8.67, p = 0.02, respectively). Second and third professional year students who participated in the geriatrics-focused course were more likely to be interested in additional geriatric care training compared to their peers who had not taken the course ( p = 0.05 each). First professional year students who did not have the opportunity to take the geriatrics course yet placed high importance on participating in a geriatrics-focused course in the pharmacy curriculum. Conclusion Student pharmacists who took a geriatrics-focused course had stronger knowledge of geriatrics and more positive attitudes regarding geriatric care training. Therefore, schools and colleges of pharmacy should consider the positive impact of a geriatrics-focused course on students' geriatric knowledge and their attitudes toward geriatric care training.