Pharmacist prescribers’ written reflection on developing their consultation skills

Abstract

It has long been argued that reflection is an essential element of lifelong learning and professional development, however pharmacy in the UK is still at an early stage in promoting the use of reflection for learning and professional practice development. This study presents an analysis of pharmacists’ written reflection on their consultation skills after a communication skills learning programme. The main themes were categorised into reflection on the Calgary‐Cambridge model of the consultation as well as reflective learning and development. Participants tended to reflect on their consultation in terms of negative events (omissions or difficulties) and positive events (where they could see that they had used a particular communication skill and it worked). Pharmacists appear to have reached a ‘deeper understanding’ of their communication skills in practice by writing reflectively and have demonstrated a reflective approach to practice which in turn is likely to benefit patient care.

Keywords:

• reflection
• reflective learning
• pharmacists
• consultation skills