Pharmacists' Behavioral Changes after Attending a Multi-Prefectural Palliative Care Education Program

Abstract

Central to the pharmacist's role in palliative care is symptom management through direct participation in patient care and the provision of optimal pharmacotherapy to support patient outcomes. Consequently, palliative care requires extensive knowledge and action for patients with cancer. Therefore, this study aimed to evaluate how pharmacists' behavior changed after attending a palliative care educational program. We conducted a web-based questionnaire survey examining the behavior of pharmacists regarding palliative care before participating in the program, two months after participating in the program, and eight months after participating in the program to determine their behavior and changes over time. For all questions, scores were higher at two and eight months after attending the program than before attending the program (p < 0.05). In addition, no significant difference was observed between two and eight months after attending the program for any question (p = 0.504-1.000). The knowledge gained from the educational program was used to repeatedly intervene with patients with cancer in order to address the various symptoms they experienced and maintain their behavior. The proven effectiveness of this program serves as a stepping stone for nationwide rollout across Japan's 47 prefectures.

Keywords: cancer; education program; multi-prefecture; palliative care; pharmacists’ behavioral change; transtheoretical model.

Figure 1

Behavioral changes of pharmacists who participated in the palliative care educational program. Small circles are outliers. An outlier is a value greater than “3rd quartile plus interquartile range times 1.5” or less than “1st quartile minus interquartile range times 1.5”. Crosses indicates the average value.