A multimodal educational approach to non-practice-based pharmacy careers

Abstract

Background: Pharmacy students have little exposure to non-practice-based (NPB) careers. However, their education prepares them for a wide array of NBP career opportunities. This work describes a multimodal approach to exposing students to careers in the pharmacy industry. Methods: This study assessed the impact of a multimodal approach to increasing awareness and understanding of NPB pharmacy careers within the PharmD curriculum. Students were surveyed before and after exposure to an elective course titled Pharmacists Roles in Drug Development (PRDD) that included a Value of Industry Pharmacist (VIP) competition and a seminar series about their knowledge, attitudes, and career interests. Results: The response rate was 39% (16/41) for students enrolled in the PRDD course and 20% (5/21) for those participating in the VIP competition but not the course. Interest in pursuing a career in industry pharmacy increased significantly after the course (p=0.018) from 39% to 56%. Self-perceived knowledge of careers in industry pharmacy increased significantly (p=0.0003) after the course. Students were extremely likely (50%), somewhat likely (17%), neutral (28%), or extremely unlikely (5%) to recommend the course to a fellow student. Also, the seminar series contributed to significantly increasing knowledge levels (p=0.001), with 20% of students reporting very high or high baseline knowledge that exceeded 60%, indicating very high or high knowledge after the seminar. Conclusion: In the current study, students showed a significant increase in interest and knowledge levels in industry pharmacy careers after participating in the course and seminar series, indicating that the methods employed in this multimodal approach were effective in educating students on alternative career pathways and piquing their interest in these pathways.