A mentalising education programme for community pharmacy workforce

Abstract

This article describes the development and content of the continuing education programme “Counseling first hand – understanding the customer and yourself through mentalising”. The education programme is targeted at the community pharmacy workforce and aims at increasing the pharmacy workforce’ awareness of mental states in pharmacy counselling in order to ultimately centre the interaction around the customer’s perspectives. As such, the education programme combines the traditions of pharmacy practice with a psychologically-based theory of interaction, i.e. mentalising. The education programme is developed between partners from the University of Copenhagen and from Pharmakon-the Danish College of Pharmacy Practice and is funded by the European Institute of Innovation and Technology (EIT) Health. The continuing education programme spans four months and combines physical attendance with online modules.

Danish community pharmacies supporting self-care for patients

“…Since 2022, the staff in Danish pharmacies have been offered an education in patient-centred communication developed and tested by Pharmakon and the University of Copenhagen in 2021 called “Counselling first hand – understanding the customer and yourself through mentalising” that aims to increase patient-centred care in pharmacies. 25 …”

Customer Education in Omnichannel Marketing – A Systematic Literature Review

“…The process of CE primarily requires a deep understanding of the client [Fosgerau et al, 2022]. Better interpretation results from adapting CE programmes to the client's exact preferences.…”

“…The community pharmacies have the potential to enrich the customer experience with CE programmes [Pohjanoksa-Mäntylä et al, 2008], but some of them do not take the chance [Khojah, 2020]. The project implemented in 2021 and described by Fosgerau et al [2022] aimed at improving pharmacists' knowledge and job satisfaction through a CE programme.…”

A mixed methods evaluation of a mentalising education programme for the community pharmacy workforce in Denmark – A promising way forward to deliver patient-centred counselling

“…However, it still appears to be challenging to implement actual patientcentred counselling in community pharmacy settings (Gyllensten, Fuller & Östbring, 2022;Kaae et al, 2022). Therefore, a new mentalising education programme for the postgraduate community pharmacy workforce has been developed in Denmark and tested in Denmark and the Netherlands to overcome these barriers (Fosgerau et al, 2022). In the framework of mentalising, emotions play a prominent role; learning to understand, recognise, and regulate emotions is decisive to the personal development alongside the ability to engage, relate, and interact with others (Allen, 2003).…”

“…Thus, the mentalising education programme aimed to develop and increase the mentalising mindset of the pharmacy workforce, including targeting their awareness of their emotional states and those of patients in pharmacy encounters. Participants were taught a specific way of communicating to display the mentalising mindset in communication (Steinberg & Andresen, 1981;Orlando, 1990;Gordon & Kragh, 1999;Clabby & O'Connor, 2004;Zoffmann, Harder & Kirkevold, 2008) called mentalising communication, which includes mirroring, active listening, values clarification, and the use of communication models (Fosgerau et al, 2022). Knowledge about traditional pharmacy practice was added to the mentalising education programme, and the teaching and training exercises were situated in a pharmacy practice setting to make the counselling patient-centred (Fosgerau et al, 2022).…”