Evaluation of the pSMILE (Palliative care-Situational Motivating Interactive Learning and Education) educational...

In 2021, the Education and Training Committee of the Japanese Society for Pharmaceutical Palliative Care and Sciences established an educational training program for pharmacists in palliative care, named Palliative care-Situational Motivating Interactive Learning and Education (pSMILE), based on web-based and face-to-face workshops. The program aims to enhance pharmacists' knowledge of palliative care and develop communication and cooperation skills.

We constructed a web-based pSMILE training program, which was later adapted for face-to-face workshops. This program consisted of two sessions, with the first half at a hospital and the second half at a clinic or community pharmacy. The participants could choose from three learning scenarios. A post-survey (within 1 week of the workshop) assessed usefulness, difficulty, length, and satisfaction. Participants also completed a web-based survey on behavioral changes related to daily palliative care following the workshop. Nine items on behavioral changes were assessed before and 1 month after the workshop, which was held from April 2021 to March 2024.

Twelve pSMILE workshops were held during this period (10 web-based and two face-to-face). A total of 296 pharmacists participated, 152 (51.4%) of whom were Board Certified Pharmacist in Palliative Pharmacy, and 292 (98.6%) responded to the before/after workshop survey. Usefulness ratings were 4.39 for Session I and 4.20 for Session II. Satisfaction ratings were high (≥ 4.5), with no significant differences based on affiliation, training format, or certification. All confidence scores of nine daily palliative care behaviors (symptom assessment; multidisciplinary information sharing; proposing pharmacotherapy; polypharmacy intervention; palliative pharmacotherapy with awareness of pharmacokinetics; explanation of delirium; response in the discharge conference; information sharing between hospitals, clinics, and community pharmacies; and pharmacotherapy suggestions in view of the post-discharge) improved significantly post-workshop (p < 0.01), across both web-based and face-to-face workshops. Certified participants had higher confidence scores both before and after the workshop, and each group showed a significant improvement.

These results suggest that either web-based or face-to-face pSMILE workshops improve the quality of pharmacists' contribution in daily palliative care. This is the first report on the effectiveness of an academically approved web-based educational program for palliative care pharmacists, comparable to face-to-face workshops.