STUDY AND COMPARISON OF KNOWLEDGE OF MEDICAL STUDENTS AND INTERNS ABOUT PHARMACOTHERAPEUTICS

Aim: Pharmacotherapy might be improved if MBBS students receive an integrated educational programme in pharmacology and pharmacotherapeutics. This study investigated whether there are differences in the pharmacology and pharmacotherapy knowledge between medical students and interns after their undergraduate training. Differences could serve as a starting point from which integrated educational programmes can be developed for better MBBS education. Methods: In a cross-sectional design, the knowledge of medical students and interns were assessed, using a standardized test with four domains (Emergency conditions, cardiovascular pharmacology, analgesics and Chemotherapy). Results: One hundred medical students and one hundred interns were included in the cross-sectional questionnaire based study. The response rate was 91.36% for MBBS and 98.16% for Interns. Interns had better knowledge of Cardivascular pharmacology than medical students (mean score of Interns 4.53? 1.3; MBBS 2.35? 1.2).In addition, data related to drugs used in emergency and chemotherapy showed much better knowledge of the interns (mean score of Interns 2.24? 0.7; & MBBS 1.97? 0.7) and (mean score of Interns 4.12? 1.05 & MBBS 3.5? 1.23) respectively. However, the two groups had almost similar knowledge of analgesic use and dosage (mean score of Interns 2.53? 0.78 & MBBS 2.41? 0.93). Conclusions: Interns have better knowledge of basic pharmacology and of the application of knowledge of pharmacology than medical students. Differences in knowledge and skills therefore might well stem from their undergraduate education. Knowledge of these differences could be harnessed to develop an integrated teaching programme for medical students.