Changes in Advanced Pharmacy Practice Experience Students' Clinical Interventions Before, During, and After COVID-19

To describe the differences in advanced pharmacy practice experience (APPE) students' clinical interventions, including the number of interventions, characterization, and acceptance, before, during, and after the COVID-19 pandemic.

Fourth-year student pharmacists for 3 faculty preceptors on inpatient internal medicine APPEs at a large, urban community medical center documented clinical interventions in an online database from May 2018 through April 2024. The database captured information related to the APPE block, preceptor, intervention category, intervention description, potential benefits, outcomes, and references. Data were extracted from the database for each APPE block and assigned into the following groupings: pre-COVID-19 (May 2018-March 2020), COVID-19 (May 2020-April 2022), and post-COVID-19 (May 2022-April 2024). Pre-COVID-19 and COVID-19 clinical interventions were compared to post-COVID-19.

The pre-COVID-19 period included 59 students who documented 1752 interventions (mean 29.7 per student); the COVID-19 period had 62 students who documented 1402 interventions (mean 22.6 per student); and the post-COVID-19 period had 60 students who documented 1266 interventions (mean 21.1 per student). Compared to the post-COVID-19 period, pre-COVID-19 had significantly more interventions per student on average; however, the post-COVID-19 and COVID-19 periods were not significantly different.

Post-COVID-19 intervention numbers have not returned to pre-COVID-19 levels. Further qualitative analysis is warranted to explain this continued downtrend in student interventions.