From Workshop to E-Learning: Using Technology-Enhanced “Intermediate Concept Measures” As a Framework for Pharmacy Ethics Education and Assessment

Workshop analysis of scenarios or vignettes has traditionally been used to develop and demonstrate the moral reasoning underpinning professional decisions. However, in order to facilitate sufficiently individualized interaction to accommodate the assessment of student competencies related to decision-making through scenarios, such workshops are traditionally used with small groups. There are associated resource implications for the scheduling of sessions and implications for tutor time where large cohorts of students are targeted. In addition, the requirement that students be face-to-face is problematic when students are in practice placements that are geographically removed. This paper demonstrates how technology and an assessment tool, known as an “intermediate concept measure” (ICM), might help address these limitations. It introduces the background to ICMs and presents the ICM as a tool that has potential to support professional education. It also shares learning experienced by one pharmacist using ICMs in pharmacy education, provides an example of how a profession-specific ICM might be formatted, suggests how the methodology might be used in undergraduate and postgraduate education and provides samples of measurables that may be incorporated into evaluation and assessment systems; both for educational interventions delivered face-to-face or partly or entirely online. The limitations of the methodologies and suggestions for further research are included.