Audio taping simulated patient encounters in community pharmacy to enhance the reliability of assessments.
OBJECTIVE
To assess whether audio taping simulated patient interactions can improve the reliability of manually documented data and result in more accurate assessments.


METHODS
Over a 3-month period, 1340 simulated patient visits were made to community pharmacies. Following the encounters, data gathered by the simulated patient were relayed to a coordinator who completed a rating form. Data recorded on the forms were later compared to an audiotape of the interaction. Corrections were tallied and reasons for making them were coded.


RESULTS
Approximately 10% of cases required corrections, resulting in a 10%-20% modification in the pharmacy's total score. The difference between postcorrection and precorrection scores was significant.


CONCLUSIONS
Audio taping simulated patient visits enhances data integrity. Most corrections were required because of the simulated patients' poor recall abilities.
Werner
Joel Benjamin
JB
Faculty of Pharmacy, University of Sydney, NSW, Australia.
Benrimoj
Shalom I
SI