Course Objective:

To create student awareness of and experience with basic communication skills and patient counseling techniques.  This course is competency based, so the ultimate goal is for you to be able to counsel a patient in an effective and efficient manner.

Specific Goals:

1) Understand the basic interpersonal communication model.

2) Develop basic communication skills.

3) Apply basic communication skills to patient counseling.

4) Demonstrate the ability to provide interactive patient counseling.

5) Discuss patient and disease factors that influence drug selection (e.g., allergy, disease state or medication history).

6) Describe the components of an effective patient/caregiver interview.

7) Identify the verbal and nonverbal components of a total communication.

8) Identify the cognitive and affective information conveyed in the verbal portion of a communication.

9) Describe the characteristics of an empathic response.

10) Be able to differentiate empathic from non-empathic response.

11) Describe ways to organize verbal and written information.

12) Use the rules of grammar, punctuation, and spelling to prepare written communications.

13) Discuss the ethical principles that govern the practice of pharmacy.