The Impact of an Educational Intervention on Enhancing Clinical Knowledge of Physicians and Pharmacists Regarding Statins and Monitoring Parameters: The Experience of a Tertiary Teaching Hospital

Abstract

Introduction

Understanding the latest guideline recommendations is crucial for healthcare professionals to apply statin therapy effectively. Thus, the purpose of this study was to evaluate the efficacy of an educational intervention in enhancing the awareness and understanding of physicians and pharmacists concerning risk assessment of Atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease (ASCVD) and the role of statin therapy.

Methods

This pre- and post-intervention study was conducted in Sana'a, Yemen's capital city, at the University of Science and Technology Hospital. The study was done between 11/2021-12/2021, and two separate educational sessions were held. The McNemar's test and Wilcoxon signed-rank test were employed as necessary.

Results

Participants' awareness of the Framingham CVD risk calculator improved significantly from 40.4% pre-intervention to 78.7% post-intervention. Similarly, understanding of the parameters used in the 10-year ASCVD Risk calculator rose from 46.8% pre-intervention to 76.6% post-intervention. The ability to identify high, moderate, and low-intensity statin therapy, for instance, increased from 34% to 63.8% post-intervention. Regarding statins' contraindications, safety, and efficacy monitoring parameters, pre-intervention knowledge was unsatisfactory, and the educational intervention improved it significantly (p <0.05). For physicians, the median ASCVD risk assessment knowledge score was significantly improved from 4 (IQR = 3-5) pre-intervention to 7 (6.25-8) immediately post-intervention, while the statin therapy clinical knowledge median score significantly improved from 3 (1.25-6.5) to 9 (7.25-14.75) post-education intervention, p-values were 0.002 and 0.003; respectively. For pharmacists, a similar significant improvement (p <0.05) in the overall knowledge scores for both ASCVD risk assessment and statin therapy was noted.

Conclusion

The educational intervention improved participants' knowledge of statin therapy and ASCVD risk assessment. Therefore, further education lectures and training programs through continuing medical education on the up-to-date guidelines' recommendations should be regularly implemented to raise awareness and improve the clinical knowledge and appropriateness of statins use in clinical settings.