Am J Pharm Educ. 2021 Oct 29:8766. doi: 10.5688/ajpe8766. Online ahead of print.
ABSTRACT
Objective A virtual educational innovation was designed and implemented to simulate insurance processing for student pharmacists. Objectives of this manuscript are to evaluate the impact of a third party payer simulation on student knowledge and confidence and report student perceptions of the activity.Methods First, second, and third-year pharmacy students at four institutions completed the self-paced simulation. Knowledge was assessed by comparing results of multiple choice questions on the pre- and post-assessments and evaluated by Wilcoxon signed rank test. Confidence was assessed by the change in self-reported confidence scale measurements and compared using Chi-squared test.Results The simulation had a significant impact on student knowledge. The largest improvement was in P1s with a pre- to post-assessment average score difference (scale 0-100) of 16.55 compared to 7.17 for P2s and 10.23 for P3s. The majority of the knowledge questions demonstrated statistically significant improvement, with variation for certain questions between groups. All groups had significantly improved self-rated confidence in their abilities. Most students agreed that they would recommend this activity to other students (91.7%) and it encouraged them to think about the material in a new way (85%).Conclusions Through an innovative simulation on prescription insurance processing, positive results were seen across all 3 levels of learners. Knowledge assessments significantly improved and student confidence increased across all groups and all confidence questions. Participants recommend this activity to other students and felt it was an effective way to learn about insurance adjudication.
PMID:34716136 | DOI:10.5688/ajpe8766
