Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
Randomized Controlled Trial
. 2022 Apr 18;22(1):289.
doi: 10.1186/s12909-022-03331-9.

Assessment of an intensive education program for pharmacists on treatment of tobacco use disorder using an objective structured clinical examination: a randomized controlled trial

Maguy Saffouh El Hajj  1 , Ahmed Awaisu  2 , Mohamad Haniki Nik Mohamed  3 , Rana Ahmed Saleh  2 , Noora Mohammed Al Hamad  4 , Nadir Kheir  5 , Ziyad R Mahfoud  6   7
Affiliations
Randomized Controlled Trial

Assessment of an intensive education program for pharmacists on treatment of tobacco use disorder using an objective structured clinical examination: a randomized controlled trial

Maguy Saffouh El Hajj et al. BMC Med Educ. .

Abstract

Background: Tobacco use is one of the major public health threats globally. Community pharmacists are uniquely positioned to offer tobacco cessation services owing to their easy accessibility by the public. To prepare Qatar community pharmacists to develop the competencies and skills required to offer smoking cessation services, an intensive tobacco control education program was designed and implemented. The study aimed to assess the impact of the tobacco education program on the pharmacists' skills and competence.

Methods: A random sample of community pharmacists in Qatar was chosen for participation in the program. Consenting participants were randomly assigned to either intervention or control groups. The intervention group received an intensive education program on treatment of tobacco-use disorder, while a short didactic session on a non-tobacco-related topic was delivered to the control group. The pharmacists' tobacco cessation skills and competencies were assessed using an Objective Structured Clinical Examination (OSCE).

Results: A total of 54 and 32 community pharmacists in the intervention group and the control group, respectively, completed the OSCE. The intensive tobacco education group achieved significantly higher total scores than the control group in all the OSCE cases. Specifically, the mean total scores for the intervention group were 15.2, 15.3, 14.2, 14.6, 16.3, and 15.2 compared to 8.8, 6.2, 7.7, 9.2, 8.3, and 11.3 for the control group (p < 0.001) for cases one to six respectively.

Conclusion: The study demonstrated that an intensive tobacco cessation education program can improve pharmacists' tobacco cessation skills and increase their tobacco cessation counseling abilities.

Trial registration: Clinical Trials NCT03518476 ( https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT03518476 ) Registration date: May 8, 2018.

Keywords: Education program; OSCE; Pharmacist; Qatar; Smoking cessation; Tobacco control.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare that they have no competing interests.

Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
Participant flow chart
See this image and copyright information in PMC

Similar articles

See all similar articles

Cited by

References

    1. Prevalence | Tobacco Atlas. Tobacco Atlas. https://tobaccoatlas.org/topic/prevalence/#. Accessed 28 Jan 2021
    1. Qatar | Tobacco Atlas. Tobacco Atlas. https://tobaccoatlas.org/country/qatar/. Accessed 28 Jan 2021
    1. Adams AJ, Hudmon KS. Pharmacist prescriptive authority for smoking cessation medications in the United States. J Am Pharm Assoc. 2018;58(3):253–257. doi: 10.1016/j.japh.2017.12.015. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Csikar JI, Douglas GV, Pavitt S, et al. The cost-effectiveness of smoking cessation services provided by general dental practice, general medical practice, pharmacy and NHS Stop Smoking Services in the North of England. Community Dent Oral Epidemiol. 2016;44(2):119–127. doi: 10.1111/cdoe.12195. - DOI - PubMed
    1. El Hajj M, Al Nakeeb R, Al-Qudah R. Smoking cessation counseling in Qatar: community pharmacists’ attitudes, role perceptions and practices. Int J Clin Pharm. 2012;34(4):667–676. doi: 10.1007/s11096-012-9663-x. - DOI - PubMed

Publication types

Associated data