Comparación de las respuestas regulatorias de Colombia y Brasil con base en los

Interview questions were designed according to the aims and objectives. A broad topic guide was designed and utilised during interviews (Appendix 1.1). Its development was informed by the GPhC regulatory requirements for reaccreditation of pharmacy curricula (General Pharmaceutical Council, 2011), discussions within the supervisory team and three pilot interviews. Specific interview questions concerning each section of the topic guide (with actual wording) were then created.

Five sections were included in the topic guide.The first of which sought to gain more information about the participant including their current Learning, Teaching and Assessment (LTA) activities, and additional roles within the school. This data was obtained solely for the purpose of contextualising participant responses.

For the remaining sections a “skills, knowledge, attitudes, values” framework was employed, in line with the terminology used in regulator reaccreditation documentation (General Pharmaceutical Council, 2011). As staff should have been familiar with the GPhC standards for the initial education of

pharmacists it was deemed appropriate that this terminology was used, as it is frequently used in GPhC documentation.

A suggestion was made by a pilot interviewee to present the definition of these terms to participants during the interview in the form of flashcards. Definitions provided were taken from the Oxford Living dictionary (2017) and were as follows:

Knowledge: Facts and information acquired through experience or education; the theoretical or practical understanding of a subject.

Skills: The ability to do something well; expertise

Attitudes: A settled way of thinking or feeling about something

Values: The regard that something is held to deserve; the importance, worth, or usefulness of something.

Although the Oxford English dictionary defines Knowledge as “facts, information, and skills acquired through experience or education; the theoretical or practical understanding of a subject” the word ‘skills’ was

removed as this was covered separately. While the definitions are shown separately here the researcher specifically referred to attitudes and values together, so that participants would not have to differentiate between the two.

The flashcards were used for two interviews, but were not used in

subsequent interviews as they were deemed to be too much of a distraction for participants. The researcher found that interviewees would spend much time reading and processing the flashcard definitions and focusing too much attention on whether the attributes they were suggesting fell under one domain or another. Instead, it was deemed more beneficial to the interview process to remove the cards and let the participant speak freely about what was most important to them, their suggestions could later be grouped and sorted by the researcher in the analysis process. By removing definition flashcards it is acknowledged that the way in which individuals interpreted the terms may have differed.

Section two sought to explore staff opinions on the current role of the

pharmacist, in particular the required skills, knowledge, attitudes and values of a pharmacist. Participants were also given the opportunity to describe any additional traits they deemed important. The purpose of this section was to focus the participant to the subject in question. It gave them time to relax into and become comfortable in the interview situation. The section also allowed the interviewee to think about what was important and to compare this with how they currently feel students are prepared for practice.

Section three sought to establish opinions on the way in which Cardiff students are currently prepared for practice, the mainstay of the interview. Use of the knowledge, skills, attitudes and values framework allowed the participant to think about how students are prepared in light of what is required of them. Staff members were also asked what they believe the school does best, and what it could do better.

Section four sought to explore suggestions for improvement along with any perceived barriers to making suggested changes. Finally, section five involved a conversation around stakeholder engagement in course design. After the interview staff were reminded of the research question and

encouraged to add any further points that were of importance to them.

In line with an iterative process the topic guide was slightly modified post pilot interviews in order to generate the highest possible quality data. Such changes included minor rewording so that statements were less leading (i.e. “How well do we currently prepare undergraduates…?” was changed to “How do we currently prepare undergraduates…?”)

The addition of a set introduction to the topic guide allowed the researcher to explain the process with the participant and put them at ease, in addition allowing the researcher to be reassured that no important information had been omitted. The researcher also added a section detailing to the

participant what was to come in the interview, to give the participant time to start thinking about their answers and allow them to feel progression through the interview.

Probing questions relating to whether the requirement for any attributes listed as being necessary had changed at all were added to section two following pilot interviews. It became evident that the role of the pharmacist had

changed, the researcher therefore deemed it important to establish whether particular traits stated by the participants were “new” in response to changing demand or whether they had always been relevant.

The addition of the prefix “as an academic…”, though minor, was helpful in focusing the interviewee this was modified accordingly depending on the staff member being interviewed (i.e. “as a teacher practitioner…” was used where a teacher practitioner was being interviewed).

The addition of the final question “are there any questions I haven’t asked

that you feel I should have asked?” was useful in the process of iteration and

allowed immediate feedback from the interviewees.

It was also decided at this stage to narrow the focus of the research question for future stakeholder groups such that participants were to be asked “how

can schools of pharmacy better prepare graduates for their pre-registration year?” as opposed to “for practice” more generally. Refining the research

question for interviews with other stakeholder groups aimed to provide participants with greater clarity and focus.

After ethical approval of the topic guide, specific interview questions (with actual wording to be used during interviews) were written in order to explore each section of the topic guide consistently with participants, ensuring each had an equal opportunity to comment. These were used during pilot

interviews in order to sense check for flow and participant understanding and included:

-­‐ Can you tell me about your current LTA activities?

-­‐ Can you tell me about any additional roles you hold within the school? -­‐ As an academic, what do you think are the most important skills for a

pharmacist to have? (Has this changed at all)

-­‐ As an academic, what do you think are the key areas of knowledge

that a pharmacist should have? (Has this changed at all?)

-­‐ As an academic, what are the key attitudes and values a pharmacist

should display? (Has this changed at all?)

-­‐ Are there any other key features of a good pharmacist?

-­‐ What are your opinions on the way in which we currently prepare our

undergraduates in terms of skills/knowledge/attitudes and values?

-­‐ How do we prepare them for life after university?

-­‐ What do we do best as a school to prepare our undergraduates for

-­‐ What do we do worst to prepare our undergraduates for practice? -­‐ How do you think this is compared with other Schools of Pharmacy? -­‐ How can we better prepare our graduates in terms of

knowledge/skills/attitudes and values? (Are there any barriers to this? Are there any ways in which this may be overcome?)

-­‐ If you were to redesign the course, what would you like to see? -­‐ Do you have any other comments related to content, delivery or

assessment?

-­‐ What are your opinions on stakeholder involvement for course

improvements?

-­‐ Who are the relevant stakeholders for the School? -­‐ How can we better engage with them?

Interview questions were asked in a particular order for each interview though not consistently as the conversation was guided by the participant’s agenda.

3.3.2 Recruitment and sampling

The researcher invited individuals based on their background and

experiences including pharmacists and non-pharmacists (those who were registered but not practicing, teacher practitioners and those with no pharmacy background), predominant area of teaching, career pathway (teaching and research or teaching and scholarship) and level of seniority (from junior lecturer through to lecturer, reader, professor and senior school staff; module leaders and non-module leaders). This was in order to ensure as wide a range of views as possible were captured and allowed differences to be explored during analysis based on different participant attributes.

Potential participants were invited directly via e-mail (n=17).