A SURVEY ON PHARMACOLOGY TEACHING PATTERNS IN UNDERGRADUATE STUDENTS IN LIBYA

Pharmacology, is the branch of biology concerned with the study of drug action, it is progressing by leaps and bounds, but medical students in southern Libya decry the way it is taught, its examinations, and the discipline’s usefulness to their practice. The aim of this study, conducted on 90 third-year Medicinae Baccalaureus (MBBS) students, was to assess the students’ attitudes toward, perceptions of and feedback surrounding pharmacology teaching. The study was administered through a pre-validatedquestionnaire containing questions based on the internationally accepted "Likert Scale". Our analysis was based on the median score and percentage distribution of the various parameters used in the questionnaire. The survey was conducted in May 2015.

The study revealed students favored many changes in pharmacology, including the trend of teaching pharmacology to third year students (72.2%), instruction on how to choose drugs rationally in future practice (86.6%), distribution of handouts before lectures (67.5%), clinical pharmacology (23.3%), teaching certain topics during pre-final or final year (61.1.0%), and a combination of multiple choice questions (MCQs) and written and oral rating evaluation methods for examination (65.5. %).Students were not in favour of change in pharmacology like learning pharmacology simultaneously with clinical conditions to correlate the drugs with the disease. In contrast, students were in favour of many changes in pharmacology, like choosing drugs rationally in them future practice, pharmacology should be integrated horizontally with other paraclinical subjects, emphasis on problem solving exercises rather than on didactic (teaching) lectures, preferring distribution of handouts before the lectures, teaching some topics during prefinal or final year to achieve the said objectives , preferring incorporation of clinically oriented lectures, and incorporation of combination MCQs, written and oral methods for examination. This study provides insight into students' perceptions regarding pharmacology teaching and its outcomes, and so would be helpful in modifying undergraduate pharmacology teaching patterns.