(322) Pharmacovigilance Education in Pharmacy Programs' Curricula in Saudi Arabia

Publication Number: 996

Background: The knowledge about pharmacovigilance sciences and activities is crucial for healthcare professionals (HCPs) before they start practicing protecting the patients from the risks from the medications. Applying pharmacovigilance tools is proven to reduce and mitigate the risks from the medications. Therefore, it is important that the HCPs be educated about pharmacovigilance during their college years. However, the information about teaching pharmacovigilance in Saudi Arabia was not discussed, and there is no clear information about it.

Objectives: This study was designed to assess the availability, extent, type, and level of pharmacovigilance education in pharmacy programs’ curricula in Saudi Arabia.

Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted between November 2021 and January 2022. A self-administered and internet-based questionnaire was filled by a representative from each college of pharmacy in Saudi Arabia. The questionnaire was sent to all college of pharmacies in Saudi Arabia. It was constituted from two parts and eighteen questions, and the scope of the questionnaire was about pharmacovigilance education, teaching and assessment methodologies, and learning outcomes. It was recommended that the representative staff be the head of pharmacy practice or clinical pharmacy department or staff from a relevant department and who teaches social and administrative sciences courses in the college. The present findings represent a descriptive analysis of the data. All analyses were conducted using statistical analysis software (SAS) version 9.4.

Results: All twenty-one government pharmacy colleges across Saudi Arabia completed the questionnaire (100%). Most of them (n=16, 76.2%) offer six-year PharmD program. Only four pharmacy programs provide pharmacovigilance as an independent course in their curricula (n=4, 19%). Two of the four programs have the course as a required-core course and two as an elective course. The rest of them and the majority include pharmacovigilance-related topics integrated with one or more courses in their curricula (n=16, 76.2%) such as pharmacoepidemiology, introduction to pharmacy, drug information and poisoning, and pharmacy law and regulatory affairs courses. The estimated average total number of hours dedicated to pharmacovigilance contents taught was 1.9 hours per week. Most of programs teach pharmacovigilance course/related topics in the fifth academic year (n=16, 76.2%).

Conclusions: There is an urgent need to adopt the pharmacovigilance education as a required-core course in the Saudi pharmacy programs’ curricula to foster medication safety practices among pharmacists in Saudi Arabia.