During the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, many schools quickly transitioned their teaching and assessment strategies to online formats. In Spring 2020, a 3-station remote Objective Structured Clinical Examination (OSCE) was implemented for first-year pharmacy students. The day following the remote OSCEs students answered three open-text prompts about the remote OSCE experience: (1) “I liked...”, (2) “I learned…”, and (3) “I suggest…”. Responses were open-coded and frequency counts were calculated to determine the most prevalent codes. Concept maps were created to visualize and explore connections between the codes. Out of 157 students, 156 students completed the reflection assignment, a 99.36% response rate. The three major themes in the Liked data were: Logistics (n = 65, 41.7%), Differences In-person Versus Remote (n = 59, 37.8%), and Skill Development (n = 43, 27.6%). The three major themes in the Learned data were: Technology (n = 66, 42.3%), Communication (n = 58, 37.2%), and Skill Development (n = 56, 35.9%). The three major themes in the Suggest data were: Logistics (n = 89, 57.1%), Technology (n = 31, 19.9%), and Continuation of Remote OSCE (n = 31, 19.9%). Overall, the remote OSCE experience was well-received, and students described it as applicable to their future pharmacy practice. Future work should explore the design, implementation, and outcomes of remote OSCEs.

Objective. To investigate the long-term (ie, 6-year) impact of a required remake vs an optional remake on student performance in a compounding laboratory course in which students' compounded preparations were analyzed. Methods. The analysis data for several preparations made by students were compared for differences in the analyzed content of the active pharmaceutical ingredient (API) and the number of students who successfully compounded the preparation on the first attempt.Results. There was a consistent statistical difference in the API amount or concentration in 4 of the preparations (diphenhydramine, ketoprofen, metoprolol, and progesterone) in each optional remake year compared to the required remake year. As the analysis requirement was continued, the outcome for each preparation approached and/or attained the expected API result. Two preparations required more than 1 year to demonstrate a statistical difference. Conclusion. The analytical assessment resulted in a consistent, long-term improvement in student performance during the 5-year period after the optional remake policy was instituted. Our assumption is that investment in such an assessment would result in a similar benefits at other colleges and schools of pharmacy.

Health sciences librarians should be aware of the variation in biomarker availability when recommending drug resources for licensing and use. Librarians can also use this study to encourage publishers to include pharmacogenomics information from the package insert as a minimum standard.

Objective. To test the impact of schedules of retrieval practice on learning brand and generic name drug information in a self-paced course. Methods. Students completed weekly quizzes on brand and generic name conversions for 100 commonly prescribed drugs. Each student completed part of the drug list on a schedule of equal, expanding, or contracting spacing, one practice (massed) or study only in a partial block design. Results. On measures of long-term retention, the contracting spacing schedule led to superior retention (67%) compared to the massed practice (50%) and study-only condition (46%); contracting practice also was significantly higher than expanding practice (58%,) or equal practice (59%). Overall performance decreased by almost 50% (final exam 95%, long-term retention 55%) over a 6-week period. Conclusion. A contracting spacing schedule was the most effective schedule of practice, and all spacing schedules were superior to massed practice or study-only conditions.

Objective. To examine the impact of pre-class concept mapping on students' ability to self-assess their degree of foundational disease state knowledge (metacognition), as well as pre-class quiz performance. Methods. Second-year pharmacy students in a problem-based learning course were responsible for self-directed learning of foundational knowledge for 14 disease states. After completing independent pre-class reading, students either (1) created group concept maps for which feedback was provided; (2) created group concept maps with no formal feedback; or (3) had no formal group activity. The next day, prior to the formal in class discussion, students completed a quiz covering foundational knowledge and predicted the number of questions they would answer correctly before completing the quiz. Quiz performance was compared between the three conditions, and bias and absolute bias were calculated to evaluate metacognitive skills. Results. There was no difference in metacognition among the conditions, as reflected by inaccuracy between predicted and actual quiz scores. However, when students engaged in concept mapping, their quiz performance was significantly higher than the business-as-usual control. Conclusion. Concept mapping did not improve metacognitive skills but did have small effects on quiz performance. More research is needed to tease apart the roles of concept mapping, group activity, and feedback in altering quiz performance and metacognitive skills.