Background Community pharmacists contribute substantially to public health and person-centred care. Emotional intelligence (EI) may help health professionals better engage with patients, handle stress in challenging situations and, presumably, better introduce and implement new services. Aim The study's aims were to compare the EI and perceived stress (PS) levels of community pharmacists who provided a new service to patients with diabetes with their controls who provided standard pharmaceutical services and to test the correlations between the two constructs. Method This study used a survey methodology. Well-validated instruments were distributed electronically to all participating pharmacists. To compare the continuous EI and PS data between the two study groups, the paired-samples t test was used. Pearson and Spearman’s correlations were used to test the associations between EI and PS and their respective subdomains. Results A total of 86 pharmacists participated in the study (n = 43 in each group). The study groups did not differ by any characteristic except gender. Their mean EI and PS levels were 120.95 ± 11.53 and 17.45 ± 4.55, respectively, with no difference between the groups. In both study groups, inverse correlations were found between PS and EI levels, with statistical significance in the control group and in the overall study population (r = − 0.611 and r = − 0.370, respectively). Conclusion Our results suggest that the introduction of the EI agenda into certification programmes for new community pharmacy services should be considered. The results also suggest that higher EI may have protective effects against PS. Additional research would clarify the need to invest more in such programmes. Supplementary Information The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s11096-023-01542-8.
Background:Community pharmacists (CPs) strongly contribute to public health and person-centered care. Emotional intelligence (EI) may help health professionals better engage with patients, handle stress in challenging situations, and presumably better introduce and implement new services. Such data in different CP populations do not exist. Aim:The study's primary aim was to compare the EI and perceived stress (PS) levels in CPs providing a new service to patients with diabetes with their controls, CPs providing standard pharmaceutical care (PhC). Method:Well-validated instruments were distributed electronically to all participating CPs. To compare the continuous EI and PS level data between the two study groups, the Independent Samples t-test, and Mann-Whitney U test was used. Pearson and Spearman’s correlations tested the associations between EI and PS and their respective sub-domains. Results:A total of 86 CPs participated in the study. The study groups did not differ by any characteristics except gender, and their EI and PS levels did not differ. In both study groups, inverse correlations were found between PS and EI levels, with strong statistical significance in the control group. Conclusion:Our study results suggest that the introduction of the EI agenda into the certification programs for new CP services should be considered. The results also suggest that higher EI may have protective effects against PS. Additional research with larger cohorts and a longitudinal design, including EI development intervention, would clarify the need to invest in CP-oriented EI programs more.
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