The influence of a patient counseling training session on pharmacy students’ self-perceived communication skills, confidence levels, and attitudes about communication skills training

Table 1 Demographic and educational characteristics of the fifth-year pharmacy students participating in communication skills training (n = 60)

Characteristic	n (%)
Gender
Female	60 (100)
Age, years (range 22–32), mean ± SD	24.18 ± 1.90
22–24	42 (70.0)
25–27	15 (25.0)
28–30	2 (3.3)
31 or older	1 (1.7)
Students’ self-rating of communication skills
Very poor	6 (10.0)
Poor	18 (30.0)
Fair	28 (46.7)
Good	8 (13.3)
Very good	0 (0.0)
Students’ assessment that their communication skills require improvement^a
Agree	11 (18.3)
Strongly agree	49 (81.7)
Communication skills course is needed in a pharmacy curriculum^b
Neutral	2 (3.3)
Agree	22 (36.7)
Strongly agree	36 (60.0)
Communication skills course is needed for pharmacy students to improve themselves professionally^c
Agree	24 (40.0)
Strongly agree	36 (60.0)
Reasons for learning communication skills^d
It helps to communicate with patients	20 (33.3)
It helps to effectively communicate with physicians, nurses, or colleagues	19 (31.7)
Communication is a part of a pharmacist’s job	13 (21.7)
It helps to improve medication adherence	10 (16.7)
It helps to deliver accurate information to patients	5 (8.3)
It helps to build trust between patients and pharmacists	4 (6.7)
It helps to better understand patients’ problems	3 (5.0)

SD standard deviation
^aOther response options were “strongly disagree” (n = 0), “disagree” (n = 0), and “neutral” (n = 0)
^bOther response options were “strongly disagree” (n = 0) and “disagree” (n = 0)
^cOther response options were “strongly disagree” (n = 0), “disagree” (n = 0), and “neutral” (n = 0)
^dPercentage does not equal to 100% because the respondents were allowed to choose more than one option

ISSN: 1472-6920