Proposal of the Spanish Society of Community Pharmacy on guided practices

Supervised Traineeship (ST) is a mandatory subject in the B.Sc. degree in Pharmacy, accounting for between 24 and 30 ECTS, the highest total for a single module.  Its goal is enhance, student’s training, with professional health care placements, community or hospital pharmacies.  For the vast majority students, this is their first hands-on experience of the profession.  However, each university establishes subject teaching methods independently and there is a great diversity in the way SP is approached across faculties.

The Spanish Society of Community Pharmacy (SEFAC) has drawn up this document to help standardize the way this subject is taught and unify criteria amongst all stakeholders: academic managers, lecturers and supervising pharmacists responsible for the training of students. Therefore, its purpose is to help improve teaching quality.

It proposes creating a specific, currently inexistent Supervised Traineeship Department; ­suggests the criteria to accredit pharmacies and supervising pharmacists; revises the functions of the associated professors and academic coordinators and the minimum competences and skills that need to be acquired.  The teaching program is also outlined. Student assessment by the Pharmacy Tutor is also addressed, along with evaluation of ­teachers, teaching methodology and students’ appraisal of the Community Pharmacy.