Delyth James, Sheila Beaumont, Sue Carter and J. Graham Davis, A Framework for Assessing the Continuous Professional Development Needs of Community Pharmacists, Pharm Educ. 2002;2 (2): 63–68.
Twenty community pharmacists were recruited to participate in a Continuous Professional Education Programme and to complete a reflective logbook over a four-week period. The intent of the study was to design and evaluate a process to identify the professional development needs of community pharmacists and to make recommendations on how to address the findings. The study was divided into four phases . Phase one involved recruitment and planning, phase two identified the CPD needs, phase three consisted of individual review and design of Personal Development Plans and phase four covered programme evaluation. Fourteen (70%) out of the twenty participants completed the study. The programme used skills assessment work stations to identify the CPD needs of the pharmacists. Lack of clinical skills was identified as one of the main barriers to the application of therapeutic knowledge in a practice center. The study concluded that skills assessment and facilitation roles should be an integral component of future CPD programme.