Development and evaluation of a medication counseling workshop for physicians: can we improve on ‘take two pills and call me in the morning’?

BACKGROUND Physicians often do not provide adequate medication counseling. PURPOSE To develop and evaluate an educational program to improve physicians' assessment of adherence and their medication counseling skills, with attention to health literacy. METHODS We compared internal medicine residents' confidence and counseling behaviors, measured by self-report at baseline and one month after participation in a two-hour interactive workshop. RESULTS Fifty-four residents participated; 35 (65%) completed the follow-up survey. One month after training, residents reported improved confidence in assessing and counseling patients (p<0.001), including those with low health literacy (p<0.001). Residents also reported more frequent use of desirable behaviors, such as assessing patients' medication understanding and adherence barriers (p<0.05 for each), addressing costs when prescribing (p<0.01), suggesting adherence aids (p<0.01), and confirming patient understanding with teach-back (p<0.05). CONCLUSION A medication counseling workshop significantly improved residents' self-reported confidence and behaviors regarding medication counseling one month later.