Understanding sexual and reproductive health content included in pharmacy curriculum: are pharmacists prepared?

Pharmacists' provision of sexual and reproductive health (SRH) services has expanded from mainly dispensing medications to including services like comprehensive counselling, prevention, screening, prescribing, and referral to other health providers. Pilot studies have been underway in Australia looking at pharmacists' resupply of oral contraceptive pills and the prescribing of contraceptive methods in QLD. With pharmacists' expanding scope of practice, understanding the SRH content included in the Australian pharmacy curriculum is essential to know whether pharmacists are adequately prepared to provide SRH services. This project sits within the NHMRC-funded SPHERE Centre of Research Excellence. This is the first dedicated Centre to lead research that is aimed at improving the quality, safety, and capacity of primary health care services to achieve better outcomes in women’s sexual and reproductive health. SPHERE is led by Professor Danielle Mazza and supported by multidisciplinary students and researchers within SPHERE as well as in the Department of General Practice. Students working under SPHERE will be supported by the research team, which consists of Post Docs, PhD students, academic registrars and honours students. They will also have the opportunity to be part of a large, multidisciplinary, collaborative team of investigators, which includes prominent national and international researchers and experts working in women’s health, general practice, pharmacy, nursing, epidemiology, knowledge translation, health economics, and policy development. This study would be suitable for BMedSci, BBiomed Sci and Pharmacy or other honours students, or as a Masters of Public Health research project.