[8] In the last decade, simulated-patient methods have been used around the globe, as an assessment and educational tool, to identify issues in current pharmacy practice and inform interventions to

shape practice behaviour of pharmacists and their staff.[3,8–18] A simulated patient (also known as pseudo patron, pseudo patient, standardised patient, simulated patient, pseudo customer, covert participant, shopper patient, disguised shopper, surrogate shopper or mystery shopper) is an individual who is trained to go to a pharmacy and enact predetermined scenarios, KU-57788 order while being indistinguishable from genuine patients, to assess aspects of customer care provided by pharmacy staff.[3,8,13,19–23] Community pharmacy is an ideal setting for this type of real-time observation and research, as pharmacists and their staff can be accessed without appointment, unlike other healthcare professionals.[24] The simulated-patient method is an unobtrusive means of observing actual staff responses in a natural environment, under conditions uninfluenced by awareness that behaviour is being monitored.[25–27] It is thus an effective method of deriving

valid, true-to-life outcomes, which are otherwise challenging to achieve by any other method.[23] Although an effective assessment tool, using simulated-patient methods solely for assessment purposes has served as a basis for negative criticism of pharmacy staff skills and performance, and thus has attracted negative selleck compound attitudes from those who have been subject to this approach.[8,18] However, when used for educational purposes, simulated-patient methods are an effective training tool, rather than Liothyronine Sodium simply an observation.[18] A recent trend in simulated-patient methods has seen a shift of emphasis from merely assessing behaviour of pharmacists and their staff, to using the outcomes of these visits as formative feedback to enhance continuous professional development.[8,16] In well-designed

studies, when simulated patients are used for educational purposes in the pharmacy setting, educators have entered the pharmacy immediately after the simulated-patient visit, to discuss the observations with pharmacists and/or their staff.[8,26] These methods not only provide an accurate assessment of practice behaviour, but also use performance feedback as a basis for further skills acquisition.[8] The simulated-patient method is negotiated with pharmacists and their staff beforehand, being fully integrated into an educational programme. This is otherwise known as ‘in principle’ consent, when participants give prior consent without knowing the exact timing of the simulated-patient visit.[16] Research has shown that the awareness of an impending simulated-patient visit serves as a powerful motivator to continue applying acquired skills, as participants cannot predict when another assessment will take place.