Perceived stress and its predictors, stressors and coping strategies among undergraduate pharmacy students in northern Nigeria.

INTRODUCTION: Pharmacy education may be associated with stress due to the nature of its curriculum and expectations of high-quality services from students on graduation. This study evaluated perceived stress and its predictors, stressors, and coping strategies among undergraduate pharmacy students in northern Nigeria. METHODS: This was a prospective longitudinal study conducted at three randomly selected pharmacy schools in northern Nigeria. The validated 10-item Perceived Stress Scale was used to assess participant stress at the beginning (Time1) and middle (Time2) of the semester. Data were analyzed with descriptive statistics, a paired sample t-test, point-biserial correlations, and multivariate linear regression at P < .05. RESULTS: The stress scores at Time1 and Time2 of the 866 participants were 18.3 ±â€¯6.0 and 19.3 ±â€¯5.4, respectively. Most participants at both Time1 and Time2 had moderate stress (76.6% and 79.6%, respectively). The multivariate regression analyses revealed gender, marital status, year of study, and access to education funds as significant predictors of stress. Major stressors identified were academic-related (76.3%) and environment-related (24.6%). Time management (69.6%) and relaxation (46.1%) were the major coping strategies. CONCLUSIONS: Moderate stress was observed among the majority of participants. Identified predictors of stress, stressors, and coping mechanisms were similar to those previously reported in other countries. Although most pharmacy students adopt positive strategies to mitigate stress, pharmacy educators should further adopt holistic initiatives to help students reduce their stress.

Ethics education for contemporary clinical pharmacy practice in Africa.

The paradigm shift to a patient-centred pharmacy practice model has resulted in dramatic increases in the number and variety of ethical and other dilemmas that confront pharmacists in their routine practice. However, ethical problems may go undetected by many pharmacists in most developing countries. Hence, there is a huge need for sound educational preparation of future pharmacists before they are faced with an urgent decision. This paper highlights the urgent need for pharmacy ethics to be adequately taught in schools of pharmacy, especially at the undergraduate and professional levels, so that future pharmacists can begin their professional careers with adequate ethical knowledge, skills, competencies and experience to detect and resolve ethical dilemmas of the contemporary patient-centred pharmacy practice.