Evaluating the effectiveness of flowcharts as an instructional method in a therapeutics course for pharmacy students

Abstract

The Integrated Cardiovascular Acute Care disease module in the second professional year at Western New England University, College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences, introduces disease states' pharmacotherapeutics such as coronary artery disease, shock, and arrhythmias. To improve learner understanding and application of this material, we introduced the use of flowcharts in the module. Flowcharts are skeletal outlines of key points, that integrate concepts of pharmacology with pharmacotherapeutics. They summarize the management of acute cardiovascular diseases by combining pharmacological concepts with evidence-based pharmacotherapeutic decision-making. The objective of this study is to evaluate the effectiveness of flowcharts as an instructional tool in the therapeutics module. The blanks flowcharts were provided to the students on the College's course management site. The instructors completed the charts using a doc-cam system during class at the end of each disease state. A pre- and post-survey was conducted to evaluate the effectiveness of these flowcharts. A topic-wise comparison of the average summative assessment scores between the classes that received flowcharts versus those that did not on summative assessments was evaluated. A pre-survey showed that 83% (n=45) agreed that flowchart use would improve their knowledge; the post-survey showed that 91% (n=60) agreed that flowcharts improved their overall knowledge in the course. While 90% (n=60) agreed that flowcharts improved their understanding of pharmacology, 95% of the surveyed participants agreed that flowcharts helped them understand the role of drugs in pharmacotherapy. Furthermore, 96% (n=60) of the participants agreed that they would like to see more use of flowcharts in the other pharmacotherapeutics modules. A topic-wise comparison of the average scores demonstrated a higher mean±SD score on summative assessments for the classes that received flowcharts versus those that did not use flowcharts. In addition, the use of flowcharts improved overall course grades. The results from our study indicate that the use of flowcharts improved content delivery and application in an acute care cardiovascular disease pharmacotherapeutics module. The flowcharts provide the students with a decision-making framework to make informed therapeutic decisions. We believe that the use of these flowcharts benefit student learning and understanding and can be used in other disease state modules.