Overview

Module 1: Drug Information Resources

Sessions Objectives

1. Introduction and history of Drug Information

• Define the drug information concepts and basics.
• Illustrate the history of drug information globally.
• Review the traditional pharmacy definition before and now.
• Explain FADIC scientific goals of drug information
• Understand how to maintain drug information between different organizations.

2. How to formulate an answerable question?

• Describe the importance of drug information centers in the evolution of pharmacy practice.
• Define Evidence Based Medicine.
• Learn how to formulate a Clinical Question using PICO Format.
• Describe the skills needed by pharmacists to perform medication information functions

3. Systematic | Structural Approach for Answering a Drug Information Request

• You will be able to know the difference between the systematic approach and the modified systematic approach
• The 7 steps involved in the modified systematic approach.
• Use the modified systematic approach in answering drug information questions
• The ability to effectively answer questions posed by health care professionals and the lay public

4. Drug Information, and Electronic Resources

• Understand different types of the resources
• Determine the difference between different types of the resources
• List important types of resources, for the professionals, and for the consumers
• Discuss different medical and pharmacy resources.

5. Descriptive and Inferential Statistics

• Describe different types of statistics.
• Understand the Visual Methods of Describing Data
• Explain the nnumerical methods of describing data: Measures of central tendency
• Define the numerical methods of describing data: Measures of Data Spread or Variability

6. Clinical Application of Biostatistics

• Describe the importance of understanding statistics in completing and evaluating scientific studies.
• Define the various levels of data.
• Determine whether the appropriate statistics have been performed and provided in a study.
• Interpret the statistical results provided in a research study to determine whether the authors’ conclusions are supported

7. Controlled Clinical Trial Evaluation and Phases

• Explain reasons why pharmacists need the skills to locate and
• Evaluate current information for pharmaceutical care activities.
• Describe the special characteristics of clinical trial that distinguish this research design for clinical research.
• Identify Internet websites to register controlled clinical trials
• Discuss methods to identify the potential, and conclusions.
• Differentiate between internal and external validity.
• Identify key information presented in sections of a clinical trial.
• Discuss needs for well-defined study objective, randomization, and blinding within a clinical trial.

8. Journal Review & Journal Club Presentation

• State the guidelines for reviewing a journal article.
• List the important aspects when examining a manuscript and write the review.
• List of components of both a research and review paper.
• Describe the standard format of the journal articles.
• Discuss the results of the study and clearly specify the limitation.
• Describe how to prepare a review article.
• Describe how to correctly cite an article in a bibliography.
• State author guidelines for publications in journals.

Duration: 8 Weeks