The Scholarship of Teaching and Learning: An Opportunity for Clinical Faculty Members in Academic Pharmacy and Other Health Professions to Develop a Program of Scholarship

Expansion in academic pharmacy and other health professions has increased the demand for clinical faculty members. The requirement to provide clinical service is unique to clinical faculty and creates a competing demand with the expectation to excel in the tripartite missions of their institution. The efforts of clinical faculty are heavily focused towards the institution’s educational mission. However, often they lack formal training in educational methodology and require ongoing professional development to hone their teaching skills. Therefore, as clinical faculty develop as scholarly teachers, the scholarship of teaching and learning (SoTL) represents an ideal form of scholarship for them to pursue. This essay provides guidance on how clinical faculty members in academic pharmacy and other health professions can transform the act of teaching into scholarly teaching to develop a program of scholarship in SoTL

Population Mobility, Globalization, and Antimicrobial Drug Resistance

Human travel contributes to antimicrobial drug resistance around the world

Self-assessed proficiency and application of various skills learned during postgraduate pharmacy teaching skills development programs

The purpose of this study was to identify teaching skills commonly taught during the postgraduate pharmacy teaching skills development programs, to describe trainees\u27 perceived teaching proficiency, and the extent to which the learned teaching skills are applied in trainees\u27 current positions. An online survey was developed for pharmacists who completed postgraduate teaching skills development programs. The survey included demographic and program queries as well as questions on 23 teaching skills. Participants self-assessed their proficiency in and application of their learned teaching skills. The online survey resulted in 122 qualified responses. After training, the perceived proficiency in nearly all 23 teaching skills was high; however, the scores for application of teaching skills were significantly lower. A majority (91.7%) of survey respondents were engaged in experiential education. There is wide variability among the postgraduate pharmacy teaching skills development programs. Though the trainees perceived their proficiency in teaching skills to be high, the acquired teaching skills were underused

Integrated Mapping of Establishment Risk for Emerging Vector-Borne Infections: A Case Study of Canine Leishmaniasis in Southwest France

BACKGROUND: Zoonotic visceral leishmaniasis is endemic in the Mediterranean Basin, where the dog is the main reservoir host. The disease's causative agent, Leishmania infantum, is transmitted by blood-feeding female sandflies. This paper reports an integrative study of canine leishmaniasis in a region of France spanning the southwest Massif Central and the northeast Pyrenees, where the vectors are the sandflies Phlebotomus ariasi and P. perniciosus. METHODS: Sandflies were sampled in 2005 using sticky traps placed uniformly over an area of approximately 100 by 150 km. High- and low-resolution satellite data for the area were combined to construct a model of the sandfly data, which was then used to predict sandfly abundance throughout the area on a pixel by pixel basis (resolution of c. 1 km). Using literature- and expert-derived estimates of other variables and parameters, a spatially explicit R(0) map for leishmaniasis was constructed within a Geographical Information System. R(0) is a measure of the risk of establishment of a disease in an area, and it also correlates with the amount of control needed to stop transmission. CONCLUSIONS: To our knowledge, this is the first analysis that combines a vector abundance prediction model, based on remotely-sensed variables measured at different levels of spatial resolution, with a fully mechanistic process-based temperature-dependent R(0) model. The resulting maps should be considered as proofs-of-principle rather than as ready-to-use risk maps, since validation is currently not possible. The described approach, based on integrating several modeling methods, provides a useful new set of tools for the study of the risk of outbreaks of vector-borne diseases

SPECIAL ARTICLES Benchmarking in Academic Pharmacy Departments

Benchmarking in academic pharmacy, and recommendations for the potential uses of benchmarking in academic pharmacy departments are discussed in this paper. Benchmarking is the process by which practices, procedures, and performance metrics are compared to an established standard or best practice. Many businesses and industries use benchmarking to compare processes and outcomes, and ultimately plan for improvement. Institutions of higher learning have embraced benchmarking practices to facilitate measuring the quality of their educational and research programs. Benchmarking is used internally as well to justify the allocation of institutional resources or to mediate among competing demands for additional program staff or space. Surveying all chairs of academic pharmacy departments to explore benchmarking issues such as department size and composition, as well as faculty teaching, scholarly, and service productivity, could provide valuable information. To date, attempts to gather this data have had limited success. We believe this information is potentially important, urge that efforts to gather it should be continued, and offer suggestions to achieve full participation

Family Commitment and Work Characteristics among Pharmacists

Factors associated with family commitment among pharmacists in the south central U.S. are explored. In 2010, a cross-sectional mailed self-administered 70 item survey of 363 active licensed pharmacists was conducted. This analysis includes only 269 (74%) participants who reported being married. Outcome measures were family commitment (need for family commitment, spouse’s family commitment), work-related characteristics (work challenge, stress, workload, flexibility of work schedule), and job and career satisfaction. Married participants’ mean age was 48 (SD = 18) years; the male to female ratio was 1:1; 73% worked in retail settings and 199 (74%) completed the family commitment questions. Females reported a higher need for family commitment than males (p = 0.02) but there was no significant difference in satisfaction with the commitment. Work challenge and work load were significantly associated with higher need for family commitment (p < 0.01), when controlled for age, gender, number of dependents, work status, and practice setting. Higher work challenge was associated with higher career satisfaction. Higher job related stress was associated with lower job satisfaction. High work challenge and work load may negatively impact family function since married pharmacists would need higher family commitment from their counterparts. The impact of work-family interactions on pharmacy career satisfaction should be further investigated

Pharmacokinetics and Buccal Mucosal Concentrations of a 15 Milligram per Kilogram of Body Weight Total Dose of Liposomal Amphotericin B Administered as a Single Dose (15 mg/kg), Weekly Dose (7.5 mg/kg), or Daily Dose (1 mg/kg) in Peripheral Stem Cell Transplant Patients▿

The pharmacokinetics and safety of extended-interval dosing of prophylactic liposomal amphotericin B (L-AMB) in peripheral stem cell transplant recipients were evaluated. The patients received L-AMB daily at 1 mg/kg of body weight or weekly at 7.5 mg/kg or received L-AMB as a single dose (15 mg/kg). The buccal mucosal tissue concentrations of L-AMB were measured. Of the 24 patients enrolled, 5 withdrew after the initial dose due to an infusion-related reaction (n = 2) or significant increases in the serum creatinine (Scr) levels (n = 3). Weekly L-AMB dosing (7.5 mg/kg) produced mean plasma concentrations of >0.300 μg/ml for the first 7 days and >0.220 μg/ml for 7 days after the second dose. A single L-AMB dose (15 mg/kg) produced mean plasma concentrations of >0.491 μg/ml for at least 7 seven days. These concentrations are within the range of the MICs reported in the literature for susceptible strains of Candida and are at the lower limits of the MICs for Aspergillus spp. Extended-interval dosing produced buccal mucosal tissue concentrations well in excess of the MICs reported in the literature for susceptible strains of Candida and Aspergillus spp. Infusion-related reactions occurred in 24% of the patients. Baseline and end-of-study Scr, electrolyte (K+, Mg2+, PO4), and serum transaminase levels were similar across the dosage groups. Five (31%) patients met the nephrotoxicity definition prior to completion of the study. Patients in the weekly or single-dose groups experienced nephrotoxicity significantly faster than the patients in the daily dosing cohort. A weekly L-AMB dose (7.5 mg/kg) or a single L-AMB dose (15 mg/kg) produced sufficient concentrations in plasma and highly vascular tissue to warrant further studies of the safety, efficacy, and practicality of the weekly prophylactic administration of L-AMB