Proposed Educational Strategies for A Reformed Pharmacy Curriculum Based on Graduate’s Self-Perceived Assessment of Pre-Service Education

Introduction: Pharmacy practice witnessed dramatic significant changes over the past years worldwide. The traditional role of the pharmacist involving preparation, dispensing and selling of medications is no longer adequate. This has evolved into direct involvement of the pharmacist in the design, implementation, and monitoring of therapeutic plans to produce specific care outcomes. The Bachelor degree in pharmacy at the University of Aden, Yemen, witnessed scarce reviews or evaluation studies on graduates and curriculum introduced in 1995 and unchanged till 2018. Objectives: To (1) assess perception of pharmacists, working in Aden, of their pre-service education and its relevance to current work and (2) analyze the available benchmarks and propose educational strategies that could be addressed in designing and adopting a reformed pharmacy pre-service curriculum in light of results of the study. Methods: A self-administered questionnaire distributed to 220 pharmacists working in urban Aden city with response rate 86% (n=189). Questions covered general personal information; perception of pre-service educational subjects/courses and their relevance to current job; status of respondents’ practice of skills and attitudes acquired during their study. Analysis of the 7-star role of pharmacist is done based on results of the study. Results: Practicing pharmacists work in 5 different settings in Aden, in community pharmacy, hospital pharmacy, industrial pharmaceutics, management of medicines and medical supplies and academic pharmacy. Majority marked existence of weak linkage between preservice curriculum and daily work demands. 16 out of the 17 basic sciences were not used in work and to a lesser degree, similar results of pharmaceutical sciences, skills and attitudes. Accordingly, seven educational strategies are proposed. Conclusion: The study showed that pharmacists working in Aden, Yemen, need different knowledge, skills and attitude to be able to perform the current job demands. The results also showed weak link between education and job practice. One of the main challenges facing pharmacy education is the adoption of educational strategies that respond to lack of active acquisition of the needed competencies to produce a “fit-for-purpose pharmacy graduate.” Keywords: pharmacy, pre-service, education, reform, strategies DOI: 10.7176/JHMN/76-01 Publication date:June 30th 202

COVID-19 Pandemic and Endemic Febrile Illnesses: The Dilemma of Exclusion and Diagnosis with Limited Capacities in Aden, Yemen

Background: In the beginning of May 2020, Aden was living a state of catastrophic events with the spread of COVID-19 pandemic with accompanying heavy raining season leading to increase of unexpected fever cases. Despite the limited diagnostic capacity, data on causes and trends of febrile illness can be valuable indicators of the causes and trends of fever problems in Aden at the time of COVID-19 pandemic. Objective: to analyze the available data on febrile illness reported in the “Cuban-Yemeni Hospital” in Aden during May-June 2020. Methods: This is a retrospective review of the available data from the hospital registry. Results: Out of 7385 febrile patients, there were 1208 confirmed Malaria cases (16.4%), 1786 clinically diagnosed Dengue cases (23.3%), 1855 clinically diagnosed Chikungunya (25%), 2023 cases of respiratory tract infections-RTI (26.6%) and only 613 probable COVID-19 cases (8.4%). The total deaths in this period was 63, most of them died due to respiratory problems. Conclusions: Malaria is  a problem of serious concern in Aden as 16% of fever in this study were confirmed by laboratory testing while Dengue and Chikungunya were reported frequently but the diagnosis is still based on clinical grounds. As the diagnostic capacity for COVID-19 was limited, the available data underestimated the COVID-19 problem. Keywords: COVID-19, Dengue, Chikungunya, Malaria, Fever, Aden, Yemen. DOI: 10.7176/JHMN/77-01 Publication date:July 31st 202

Assessment of Readiness of Newly Graduated Health Professionals to Communicate with Patients in Duhok, Kurdistan Region, Iraq

Communication Skills (CS) are essential to health workforce to conduct effective professional-patient interaction. In Iraq, majority of newly graduated health professionals are engaged in provision of direct health services. However, undergraduate curricula preparing these professionals include no distinct component to train them on CS. This study aims at assessing the status of CS among Health Professions Education (HPE) graduates of University of Duhok (UoD) and estimating the perception of their patients toward those skills. This cross-sectional study was conducted in 2014. Data on communication skills was obtained, from samples of different health professionals which included: medical doctors (junior residents, nurses, dentists and pharmacists) who recently graduated from different colleges at the UoD. Also, data from was obtained, their patients, to assess their satisfaction of the professionals’ CS. For assessing core CS, a specially designed checklist was adopted from Calgary-Cambridge Guide. Also, senior clinicians were asked on CS performed by their junior residents. Results show that 88% of the senior academic staff regarded CS as “highly essential” and 66% of them were not satisfied with interns’ conduct and suggested that CS should clearly be included in the medical curricula. The basic CS were perceived by patients as either not practiced or wrongly practiced. Patients were unsatisfied with the CS of their attending HPs during observed consultation sessions. The study shows obvious lack of CS among HPE graduates of UoD with patients’ dissatisfaction of their CSs. It seems legitimate to propose that relevant training elements to be designed and incorporated within training modules are needed to realize as a core element of the curriculum of all HPE colleges at the UoD. Keywords: Communication, skills, perception, graduates, Kurdistan-Iraq. DOI: 10.7176/JHMN/73-02 Publication date: April 30th 202