• Jennifer L Petrie.
• School of Pharmacy, University of Wyoming, Laramie, 82071, USA. jpetrie@uwyo.edu
• Am J Pharm Educ. 2011 Aug 10; 75 (6): 121.

ObjectiveTo integrate fourth-year doctor of pharmacy (PharmD) students within a level II trauma center team to improve their patient care and professional communication skills.DesignPharmD students completed 2 consecutive 4-week internal medicine APPEs during the course of their fourth year, which included approximately 5 weeks working on an interprofessional trauma team. During patient rounds with the interprofessional trauma team, students provided patient care in a stepwise approach, drug information responses, patient counseling, and other services requested by team members.AssessmentAbility-based outcomes (ABOs) assessment, faculty evaluations, and student self-assessment were conducted in the following areas: effective communication, drug therapy assessment and decision making, critical thinking and problem solving, and drug information retrieval. Students' mean score in these areas was 3.8 on a 5-point scale. Areas in which students needed improvement included: providing recommendations in a timely manner, self-confidence, identifying opportunity to verbally communicate with other team members, and addressing insecurities when answering drug information questions posed by the team.ConclusionIntegrating fourth-year PharmD students within a trauma and acute surgery team and use of ABO assessment allowed for identification of areas of the curriculum in which improvements were needed, resulting in a more targeted approach earlier in the curriculum to improve students' abilities to provide appropriate and effective patient care in an interprofessional setting.

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