Activity

The objective of this study was to examine pharmacy prerequisites and estimate the costs prospective students may incur to complete those requirements.

Prepharmacy requirements for doctor of pharmacy (PharmD) degree programs in the United States (US) (n=137) were sourced from school websites in 2018. see more Credit hour costs for community colleges, public four-year institutions, and private four-year institutions were collected. Chi-square and independent t-tests compared group differences.

Schools required 66.12±8.15 prerequisite credit hours (range 41 to 91 hours). All schools required one course in general chemistry and organic chemistry. A higher proportion of schools in 2018 required anatomy/physiology and statistics when compared to 2009. Estimated costs to complete prerequisites ranged from US $16,359 at a community college to US $187,800 for a bachelor’s degree at a private institution.

Trends in healthcare and education make it timely for schools to reconsider prerequisites. Renewed consideration should be given to identifying what is core to the profession and the minimum competencies students must demonstrate for entry into PharmD programs.

Trends in healthcare and education make it timely for schools to reconsider prerequisites. Renewed consideration should be given to identifying what is core to the profession and the minimum competencies students must demonstrate for entry into PharmD programs.

An integrated, competency-based curriculum that fosters social accountability including cultural sensitivity among graduates is an educational strategy towards producing practice-ready professionals. This study aimed to evaluate pharmacy graduates’ perceptions of competency, integration, and social accountability in the undergraduate curriculum of Nigerian schools of pharmacy.

A cross-sectional online survey consisting of a 42-item questionnaire was administered to 467 purposively selected pharmacy graduates who completed their undergraduate training between January 2012 and February 2020 from 20 accredited Nigerian pharmacy schools. Mann-Whitney U test was used to determine the differences in the participants’ responses on a Likert scale.

Of 467 participants, 54.4% felt that the Nigerian undergraduate pharmacy curriculum was not adequate in content, while 54.2% felt the courses in the curriculum were not well integrated to facilitate easy learning by students. About half (50.6%) strongly agreed or agreurriculum but this needs to be properly structured. The pedagogy strategy for learning cultural sensitivity should be further interrogated.

This study described and compared trends in the distribution of gender and race/ethnicity for doctor of pharmacy (PharmD) students and faculty in schools and colleges of pharmacy in the United States.

Institution-level gender (male and female) and racial/ethnic (White, Black/African American, Hispanic/Latino) data for full-time faculty were obtained from the American Association of Colleges of Pharmacy institutional database for 2009-2019. PharmD students’ demographic data during the same study period were collected separately for applications, enrollments, and degrees conferred. Generalized linear regression models were applied to examine trends in proportion of PharmD students and faculty distribution in subgroups of different gender and race/ethnicity at P<.05. All analyses were conducted using SAS, version 9.4 (SAS Institute).

Significantly increasing trends in female full-time faculty, PharmD applications, and enrollments were observed; however, the trend in female PharmD degrees conferred remaif PharmD students.

In order to advance curricula and faculty career progression, it would be helpful to increase publishing success and productivity in educational scholarship. The objective of this study was to describe the key factors and strategies that contribute to publishing success and productivity in the publication of educational scholarship by clinical pharmacy faculty.

Participants were identified from 2007 to 2016 PubMed and Science Direct publication records or by having received the American Association of Colleges of Pharmacy Emerging Teaching Scholars Award. Participants were required to have an active clinical practice and not have administrative positions or doctor of philosophy training. Qualitative data were gathered through dyadic and individual interviews and analyzed to identify core factors contributing to publishing success and productivity.

Nine clinical pharmacy faculty participated in dyadic or individual interviews, including seven associate professors and two professors. Participants’ teachineducational scholarship as in other scholarly areas. In addition, the roles of team building, receiving and providing mentorship, and the development of small significant networks merit further investigation as assets to productivity.

Team-based learning (TBL) is a small group active learning andragogy promoting the development of critical thinking, communication, and teamwork skills. Across higher education, the adoption of educational technology is often driven by many purported benefits, features, and conveniences, including learning from anywhere, easy access to materials and assessment, task automation, performance tracking, engagement monitoring, and higher fidelity for simulated experiences. Institutions may also choose to adopt technology to boost program reputation and visibility. However, unexpected effects following the adoption of new technology may interfere with active learning, trust, and cohesion between learner-learner or learner-instructor.

In many cases, the potential long-term impact of technology on teaching and learning is overlooked. This commentary calls awareness to and discusses the potential impact of adopting technology on active teaching and learning processes in the context of TBL.

A systematic process for programs to explore the influence of technology on the essential elements of teaching and learning, to support decision making, and to focus on quality educational processes is proposed. Programs should systematically consider influences on quality, access, independent work, peer interactions, and contextual approach when adopting technology.

A systematic process for programs to explore the influence of technology on the essential elements of teaching and learning, to support decision making, and to focus on quality educational processes is proposed. Programs should systematically consider influences on quality, access, independent work, peer interactions, and contextual approach when adopting technology.

Collaborative educational research and scholarship is a powerful tool to help schools/colleges of pharmacy learn from and with each other to continuously improve by sharing best practices.

There are significant advantages including developing projects with more generalizability and impact, leveraging different and complementary expertise, informal mentorship of junior faculty researchers, task sharing, and group accountability. There are also challenges such as managing multiple participants, sticking to productivity goals and timelines, and scheduling virtual meetings across multiple time zones.

For a number of years, the American Association of Colleges of Pharmacy’s Assessment Special Interest Group has intentionally created opportunities for new connections with the purpose of fostering scholarship projects to pursue interesting questions and engage in educational research with other like-minded colleagues. The purpose of this commentary is to share with members of the academy several practical tips for leading and engaging in group projects of educational scholarship.

For a number of years, the American Association of Colleges of Pharmacy’s Assessment Special Interest Group has intentionally created opportunities for new connections with the purpose of fostering scholarship projects to pursue interesting questions and engage in educational research with other like-minded colleagues. The purpose of this commentary is to share with members of the academy several practical tips for leading and engaging in group projects of educational scholarship.Non-invasive imaging plays an increasingly important role in assessing the extracranial vasculature. The applications of computed tomography angiography (CTA) and magnetic resonance angiography (MRA) continue to expand with growing demand for stroke imaging and anatomical assessment preceding vascular intervention. Imaging of the neck is performed for a variety of clinical indications with different imaging protocols. Even on non-dedicated vascular imaging, such as soft-tissue studies, the neck vessels and the proximal aortic arch are readily evaluable, providing an opportunity to promptly identify critical vascular abnormalities with significant therapeutic implications. Vascular abnormalities can have non-specific clinical signs and symptoms resulting in delays in both diagnosis and treatment. Understanding the common locations and appearances of vascular pathologies will help the radiologist to develop a systematic search strategy for evaluating neck imaging. Not only is identifying the pathology of paramount importance but also understanding how imaging further prognosticates and determines treatment options. As imaging techniques advance, further vascular radiological features are recognised with therapeutic implications, particularly for stroke. Such features include plaque morphology and vulnerability with imaging helping to identify those at high risk of stroke and recurrent strokes. Using clinical cases from a quaternary care academic medical centre a spectrum of clinically relevant arterial pathologies and associated features that could add further benefit to the radiology report are illustrated. A suggested systematic approach to evaluating the vasculature on neck imaging is also presented.Hybridized periodic mesoporous organosilica (PMO) nanoparticles are expected to provide a multifunctional theranostic platform for precision medicine by combining the advantages of different organic and inorganic components. In this work, double-shell-structured PMO nanotheranostics composed of ethane- and thioether-bridged organosilica shells were synthesized. Gold colloids were generated in situ by the thioether groups on the inner shell. The obtained double-shell PMO@Au (DSPA) has uniform size, large surface areas, ordered mesochannels and photothermal conversion capability. After being encapsulated with perfluorohexacene (PFH), DSPA-PFH produced a strong ultrasound signal upon laser irradiation due to the phase transit of PFH during hyperthermia. DSPA-PFH showed enhanced photothermal therapeutic efficacy, great ultrasound contrast, and minimal toxicity both in vitro and in vivo. These results demonstrated the distribution of different organosilica could be delicately adjusted in hybridized PMO nanoparticles. Furthermore, it showed the potential of using hybridized PMO nanoparticles as a theranostic platform for biomedical applications by combining unique characteristics of different organosilica through rational design.Constructing highly efficient and cost-effective photocatalyst system has been a big challenge for photocatalysis. Herein, CdS nanosphere (N-CdS), hollow CdS (H-CdS) and a series of H-CdS@NiCoP core-shell nanospheres have been successfully prepared via a facile hydrothermal method. The activity test showed that H-CdS exhibited higher photocatalytic activity (3.34 mmol g-1h-1) compared with N-CdS (0.99 mmol g-1h-1) under visible light irradiation (λ ≥ 420 nm), suggesting that hollow structure could effectively improve photocatalytic activity. Moreover, the H-CdS@NiCoP-7 wt% displayed a maximum photocatalytic H2 evolution rate of 13.47 mmol g-1h-1, which was about 4 times and 2.5 times higher than that of pristine H-CdS and H-CdS@Pt-3 wt%, respectively. Furthermore, H-CdS@NiCoP-7 wt% exhibited a good stability during 20 h test. The physicochemical properties were characterized by XRD, SEM, TEM, XPS, UV-vis DRS, PL and photoelectrochemical technique. The results showed that NiCoP addition can construct p-n junction with H-CdS and effectively promote the charge transfer from CdS to NiCoP, which improved the photocatalytic hydrogen evolution activity.