Therapeutic lifestyle strategies taught in U.S. Pharmacy Schools.
BACKGROUND
Several organizations representing pharmacy and other health professions stress the importance of teaching public health topics as part of training future practitioners. The objective of our study was to assess the number of U.S. pharmacy schools that incorporate lifestyle modification topics into their curricula.


METHODS
We developed an electronic survey on lifestyle modification topics and sent it to each of the 89 pharmacy schools in the United States. The survey defined lifestyle modification topics as topics that address nutrition, exercise, weight loss, smoking cessation, and alcohol use.


RESULTS
Of 89 pharmacy schools contacted, 50 (56%) responded to the survey. Of the 50, four offer at least one required course in a lifestyle modification topic, seven offer at least one elective course, and one offers a required course that incorporates more than one lifestyle modification topic. Five required and nine elective courses were identified from the responses. Nutrition was the most commonly offered required course topic, followed by smoking cessation, exercise, weight loss, and alcohol use.


CONCLUSIONS
Few pharmacy schools are addressing recommendations to promote public health education through formalized didactic courses. More courses on lifestyle modification topics should be offered to pharmacy students, who will be highly accessible to the public as pharmacists and will be able to offer education to enhance public health focused on the prevention of chronic diseases.
Lenz
Thomas L
TL
Department of Pharmacy Practice, Creighton University Medical Center, 2500 California Plaza, Omaha, NE 68178, USA. tlenz@creighton.edu
Monaghan
Michael S
MS
Hetterman
Elizabeth A
EA
D003479:Curriculum; D004512:Education, Pharmacy; D006266:Health Education; D040361:Healthy People Programs; D006801:Humans; D008019:Life Style; D014481:United States