DEVELOPMENT AND EVALUATION OF A COMPUTER-ASSISTED INSTRUCTIONAL PROGRAM IN AN ADVANCED PHARMACOTHERAPEUTICS COURSE

The manuscript describes the development, implementation, and evaluati on of a computer-assisted instructional (CAI) program to facilitate le arning in an advanced pharmacotherapy course taught to Doctor of Pharm acy students. The target disease states for this pilot program were pe ptic ulcer disease (PUD) and gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD). O bjectives included: (i) developing a CAI program for the therapeutic m anagement and pathophysiology of PUD and GERD; and (ii) determining th e acceptance of the PUD/GERD CAI program as a method of teaching pharm acotherapeutic principles. All University of Georgia Pharm. D. student s enrolled in the Fall 1995 Advanced Pharmacotherapeutics course were invited to use the CAI program after four hours of PUD/GERD lectures. Students completed a survey upon completion of the PUD/GERD CAI progra m. This survey evaluated students' acceptance and perceptions of the e ffectiveness of the PUD/GERD CAI software as an instructional instrume nt. Results indicated that students (n=40; 100 percent of the class) p erceived that the PUD/GERD CAI program was a valuable learning experie nce (4.20 +/- 0.60; Likert scale: 1 = ''strongly disagree'' to 5 = ''s trongly agree'') and felt it enhanced patient-problem solving skills ( 3.96 +/- 0.87). In addition, students expressed the desire to use CAI programs for other pharmacotherapeutics topics (4.45 +/- 0.63). Althou gh students enjoyed using the PUD/GERD CAI program (4.28 +/- 0.65), th ey disagreed with the statement that the CAI program should be used in place of traditional pharmacotherapeutics lectures (1.75 +/- 0.70) an d favorably indicated that it should be used as a supplement to lectur es (4.55 +/- 0.67, P<0.01). Computer-assisted teaching in combination with traditional pharmacotherapeutics lectures is valuable in the inst ruction of pharmacotherapeutics.