Class of 2012 Abstract / Specific Aims: To determine pharmacy students' knowledge and attitudes towards herbal medicine, and to identify factors that have the most influence on herbal knowledge.
Subjects: Students in the 1st, 2nd, 3rd, or 4th years of the Doctor of Pharmacy program at the University of Arizona.
Methods: Questionnaires administered during regularly scheduled classes and email collected knowledge, attitudes, and demographic data. This included age, gender, highest level of education, completion of herbal medication/OTC course, practice site, availability of herbals and herbal information at the practice site, and use of herbal medication in a family member.
Main Results: Questionnaires were completed by 270 out of the 395 students enrolled in pharmacy school. An average of 4.8 ± 3.02 out of the 14 questions (34%) were answered correctly on the knowledge section. Pharmacy students agreed that providing information about herbal medication is a pharmacist's professional responsibility and that an elective course on herbal medications would be useful (mean = 3.31 ± 1.52 and 3.73 ± 1.32 respectively on a scale of 0-5 where 5 = strongly agree and 0 = do not agree). Pharmacy school year and completion of an herbal/OTC course were the largest contributing factors to higher scores on the knowledge portion.
Conclusions: With an average knowledge score of less than 50% and average rating of less than 2.5 out of 5, pharmacy students have a weak understanding and a low confidence level in recommending and counseling patients on herbal medications. Requiring a course that includes herbal medications may be beneficial.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:arizona.edu/oai:arizona.openrepository.com:10150/623650 |
| Date | January 2012 |
| Creators | Ling, Jessica, Tang, Diana |
| Contributors | Lee, Jeannie, College of Pharmacy, The University of Arizona |
| Publisher | The University of Arizona. |
| Source Sets | University of Arizona |
| Language | en_US |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | text, Electronic Report |
| Rights | Copyright © is held by the author. |
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