Introduction: Stop the Bleed® (STB), a national campaign to teach laypeople how to identify and manage a life-threatening bleed. Studies have identified that medical students can master and teach the skills of STB training. However, there is limited data evaluating pharmacy students learning and teaching STB training. We hypothesized that pharmacy students should also have the ability to master STB skills and deliver STB instruction to the community. Methods: This was a prospective, multisite study evaluating pharmacy students’ ability to learn and teach STB skills. Pharmacy students who completed faculty-led STB training at 3 participating schools of pharmacy between 5/1/21 to 12/31/22 were included. Learners were evaluated using a self-administered survey with 5-point Likert scale questions and a skills rubric filled out by a pharmacist STB instructor. Community outreach participants who attended pharmacy student-led STB training sessions were asked to complete a self-assessment. Survey responses were excluded if they had a < 50% response rate or if no consent was provided. For statistical analysis, descriptive statistics, chi-square test, ANOVA and linear regression were performed. Results: A total of 439 students completed STB training. Of these students, 82.2% filled out the survey. After exclusion, 303 student responses were included in the analysis. There was a statistically significant (p< 0.001) increase in student confidence in being able to use a tourniquet, apply pressure to a wound, treat severe active bleeding and teach bleeding control to others. On the 15-point skills assessment, 295 students (67.7%) received 100%, 16.5% missed 1 point, 8.7% missed 2 points and 7.1% missed 3 or more points. Linear regression showed the student’s training institution to be a positive predictor of having a high skills assessment score (adjusted R=0.089, p< 0.001). Survey responses from community participants who completed a pharmacy student-led STB training showed a statistically significant increase in confidence in being able to apply direct pressure (p=0.001) and pack a bleeding wound (p=0.003), use a tourniquet (p< 0.001) and define the ABCs of bleeding control (p< 0.001). Conclusions: This study demonstrates that pharmacy students are able to learn and teach STB training others.
Won et al. (Sun,) studied this question.