Background
Opportunities to connect and engage with fellow oncology pharmacists offered through professional societies are usually limited to annual society meetings or standalone courses, commonly held outside NSW. Recognising a need to promote collaborative learning and foster networking opportunities across NSW, in May 2009 two senior cancer care pharmacists established a NSW Oncology/Haematology Pharmacists ‘interest’ group (NSW-OHPIG). Ten years on, these quarterly educational and networking meetings as well as an email discussion and communication forum have been maintained.
Aim
Evaluate pharmacist’s satisfaction with collaborative learning and networking opportunities through the NSW-OHPIG.
Methods
Agendas, attendance and feedback from NSW-OHPIG meetings (May2009-Aug 2018) were reviewed. Likert-scale scoring on feedback was collated and analysed for education content, relevance to practice and quality of presenter. A survey was disseminated to the NSW-OHPIG to gain insight into pharmacist demographics, experience, practice location, professional affiliations, methods for maintaining skills and clinical knowledge and overall satisfaction with NSW-OHPIG meeting structure, educational content and networking opportunities.
Results
Thirty eight NSW-OHPIG meetings were reviewed incorporating 107 presentations; 54/107 (50%) by oncology pharmacists, 48/107 (45%) by consultants and 5/107 (5%) by nurses. Median ratings for both content and relevance was 5/5 (excellent) and 4/5 (very good) for quality of presenter. 34/50 (68%) pharmacists responded to the survey; 34/34 (100%) highly valued networking opportunities through the NSW-OHPIG and 32/34 (94%) were highly satisfied with meeting structure, format and content.
Conclusions:
This evaluation has demonstrated that NSW oncology pharmacists highly value the opportunity through the NSW-OHPIG to regularly come together to interact and in the process, build and share knowledge and solve problems.
Future direction for the NSW-OHPIG includes expanding participation to rural and regional NSW through hosted webinars, collaborative pharmacy-based research projects and exploration of digital platforms to deliver education to an increasingly modern learner.