Pharmacy students’ attitudes towards physician–pharmacist collaboration: Intervention effect of integrating cooperative learning into an interprofessional team-based community service

ABSTRACT

The aim of this study was to evaluate the attitudes towards physician–pharmacist collaboration among pharmacy students in order to develop an interprofessional education (IPE) opportunity through integrating cooperative learning (CL) into a team-based student-supported community service event. The study also aimed to assess the change in students’ attitudes towards interprofessional collaboration after participation in the event. A bilingual version of the Scale of Attitudes Toward Physician–Pharmacist Collaboration (SATP²C) in English and Chinese was completed by pharmacy students enrolled in Wuhan University of Science and Technology, China. Sixty-four students (32 pharmacy students and 32 medical students) in the third year of their degree volunteered to participate in the IPE opportunity for community-based diabetes and hypertension self-management education. We found the mean score of SATP²C among 235 Chinese pharmacy students was 51.44. Cronbach’s alpha coefficient was 0.90. Our key finding was a significant increase in positive attitudes towards interprofessional collaboration after participation in the IPE activity. These data suggest that there is an opportunity to deliver IPE in Chinese pharmacy education. It appears that the integration of CL into an interprofessional team-based community service offers a useful approach for IPE.

KEYWORDS:

• Community service learning
• cooperative learning
• integration
• interprofessional education
• physician–pharmacist collaboration
• Scale of Attitudes Toward Physician–Pharmacist Collaboration

Declaration of interest

The authors report no conflicts of interest. The authors alone are responsible for the content and writing of this article.

Funding

This work was supported by a Provincial Teaching Research Project in Hubei (2014230).

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by a Provincial Teaching Research Project in Hubei (2014230).