Comparative NAPLEX Performance of Graduates of US Pharmacy Programs Accredited by ACPE Prior to and Since 1992

Abstract

Objective. To assess the performance on the standardized licensure examination for graduates from "newly accredited" versus "more established" pharmacy programs. Methods. The performance of graduates from newly accredited programs (those receiving initial full accreditation since 1992) was compared with graduates of more established programs (those receiving initial full accreditation prior to 1992). North American Pharmacy Licensing Examination (NAPLEX) data for first-time test takers during the May-August window was compared for the years 2000 through 2003.Results. Small differences in scaled scores and first-time NAPLEX passing rates were found between graduates of newly accredited programs and graduates of more established programs. Conclusion. These results suggest that the accreditation review process for newly accredited programs is appropriately addressing quality education as related to passage of licensure examinations. Analysis of passing rates and scaled scores in the forthcoming years will be necessary to observe if these trends continue.

Systematic Review of Predictors of Success for the North American Pharmacist Licensure Examination

“…The details of the included studies and their findings are summarized in Table 1. [9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22][23][24][25][26][27][28] Of the excluded articles, 3 were duplicate information (ie, a poster which was later published as full-text), 8 articles were commentaries, editorials, or non-peer reviewed publications, 5 articles did not have NAPLEX passing as an outcome, 3 articles correlated NAPLEX passing after a change in the curriculum, and 1 article reported correlation between the student characteristics with pre-NAPLEX scores. The included studies were published over a period of 15 years from 2005 to 2020, investigated NAPLEX passing from pharmacy programs ranging from a single institution to 137 institutions, and collectively covered over 13,000 individual students' NAPLEX results.…”

“…The three nation-wide, multiinstitution studies evaluated only the characteristics of the programs and not the student variables. 9,26,27 To comprehensively determine the predictability of student-dependent characteristics for NAPLEX success, a large-scale study of all pharmacy programs would be warranted.…”

“…The IPBP group performed better compared with the traditional group in average total scaled score (115.1 vs 107.6; p<.001), in area 1 scores (13.6 vs 13.1; p=.013), and in area 2 scores (13.5 vs 12.5; p<.001), respectively; however, no significant difference was found in area 3 scores. (p(p(p Institution-dependent factors: Zaremski et al 9 compared NAPLEX first-time pass rate between 74 programs accredited before 1992 and 9 programs accredited in or after 1992, and found small but significant difference between the two groups: 19,124 (96.4%) passed from pre-1992 vs. 1,070 (94.9%) passed from post-1992 (p<.05). However, no statistical difference was found on the first-time pass rate in 2000, 2001, and 2002, except for year 2003 (p value not reported).…”

Implementation of an Integrated Longitudinal Curricular Activity for Graduating Pharmacy Students

“…25 The NABP used a 3-parameter Item Response Theory model to calculate test takers' scaled score (ranges from 0 to 150, with 75 as a cutoff for a passing scaled score). 26 A few teams faced challenges in their electronic communications, as would be expected with a distance project. Many teams reported that 100% of their work was done electronically because of their varied geographic locations.…”