Stigmatizing beliefs: How leading patient medication education groups on an inpatient psychiatric unit impacts pharmacy learners

Abstract Introduction: Stigma is an important challenge facing patients with mental illness. Stigmatizing attitudes may impact the quantity and quality of care patients receive. Interaction with these patients may reduce stigmatizing attitudes in pharmacy learners. Patient medication education groups (PMEGs) provide learners with an opportunity for this interaction. The objectives of the study were to evaluate pharmacy learner's attitudes toward patients with mental illness and their comfort and ability to provide pharmaceutical services to this population before and after leading a PMEG on an adolescent inpatient psychiatric unit and to evaluate the feasibility of a larger, future trial. Methods: Third- or fourth-year student pharmacists or first-year pharmacy residents observed a postgraduate year-2 (PGY2) pharmacy specialty resident in psychiatry leading PMEGs on the adolescent unit of an inpatient psychiatric hospital. Then, they discussed their own ideas for design and delivery of a group (with feedb...