New study reveals impact of resilience among pharmacy students

28 October 2024

A cross-institutional team of university healthcare educators, led by Monash University, has conducted a study which compares how resilience is directly related to academic performance across two groups of pharmacy students: school leaver undergraduate learners, and mature age graduate entry learners.

The study, published in BMC Medical Education, found mature age graduate entry students were more likely to exhibit positive resilience attitudes and behaviours, less likely to experience burn-out and, consequently, performed significantly better on assessments compared to the undergraduate cohort.

The researchers combined both objective and subjective data to compare resilience across the two groups, including a survey which asked them to respond to how they would feel if they received low grades across a range of assessments. A total of 54 per cent of the undergraduate students said they agreed or strongly agreed it would make them feel “everything was ruined or going wrong”, while only 32.2 per cent of the mature age students felt the same way.

Dr Betty Exintaris, one of the study’s lead authors, is Associate Dean Learning and Teaching, Associate Dean Equity, Diversity and Inclusion, and Resilience Lead at Monash’s Faculty of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences. She also belongs to Global Resilience Team (GRiT), an international network dedicated to building resilience in the pharmacy workforce.

Dr Exintaris said the goal of the study was to identify strategies to help Australia’s future pharmacy workforce build resilience in today’s fast-paced healthcare workplaces.

“Resilience is an essential psychological trait, empowering people to adapt and thrive in the face of challenges. This is particularly important in tertiary learning for future health professionals where the ability to manage stress and navigate challenges is vital for career longevity in a high intensity healthcare environment,” said Dr Betty Exintaris.

General stressors and relief of stressors across the two student groups varied. For example, undergraduate students were more than twice as likely to be experiencing a fear of failure, while the stress of increased workload was more prevalent among the graduate entry group.

Concurrently, emotional modulation such as crying, meditation, journaling and breathing exercises was a coping strategy more widely employed by the undergraduate students, compared with ‘proactive management of life’ such as time management and avoiding procrastination, which was more likely among the graduate entry students.

Corresponding author and Deputy Pharmacy Course Director at Monash’s Faculty of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences, Dr Angelina Lim, said there has been an essential need in pharmacy education to gain a deeper understanding of resilience levels across different cohort groups.

“Within health and pharmacy education, so far there have been limited cross-cohort analyses of resilience, which means differences in resilience strategies in student cohorts have been under-researched. This study has helped to shine a light on the level of resilience among two core groups, which can in turn inform better ways to tailor support for students going forward,” said Dr Lim.

Poor mental health and burnout is prevalent across the healthcare sector. Mental Health Australia’s 2023 Annual Healthcare Professionals Survey, which has provided a year-by-year snapshot of health care workers since the start of the pandemic, showed that burnout rates across the sector were sitting at 84 per cent in 2022.

“Currently there is still a need for resilience programs to be implemented in higher education, not only to support academic success, but to also ensure graduates are equipped to manage stress and burnout well into their careers,” said Dr Exintaris.

Dr Lim concluded: “Our hope is that our findings will provide health and clinical educators in university health degrees, clinical placements and clinical workplaces some insights into variations of resilience and coping mechanisms across different types of pharmacy students. We hope to continue this research to investigate strategies to help prepare our graduates for a fast paced clinical workplace but also learn to cope with setbacks/hardship encountered through their university degree to improve their university experience.”

The students who completed the self-reported resilience survey included 208 undergraduate students currently enrolled into Monash University’s Bachelor of Pharmacy (Hons) / Master of Pharmacy program and 64 graduate entry students who have completed a relevant science-related degree program and have entered the Bachelor of Pharmacy (Hons) / Master of Pharmacy.

To read the full study visit: The impact of resilience on academic performance with a focus on mature learners.

https://doi.org/10.1186%2Fs12909-024-06099-2

END