Objective: The objective of this review was to scope the impact of university rural curriculum and rural clinical placements on students' intentions to practise rurally and rural pharmacists' choice of rural practice.
Design: The scoping review used Arskey and O'Malley's methodological framework, searching the following databases: MEDLINE, CINAHL, Informit and Scopus. This scoping review followed PRISMA for article reporting.
Setting: Studies were selected from those conducted in Australia, USA, Canada and Africa.
Participants: Pharmacy undergraduate students, interns, registered and academic pharmacists were included.
Main outcome measure: The pharmacy curriculum at universities and placements undertaken, specifically in rural and remote settings, were evaluated to determine their influence on intention to practise as a rural pharmacist.
Results: The search strategy generated 294 records, 31 of which were included in the scoping review. Key findings were mapped to two domains, which broadly included the impact of rural placements and curriculum on intention to practise rurally. Some universities have attempted to introduce a rural curriculum, but reported resources as a barrier and the lack of resulting evidence of students' intention to practise rurally. Although results indicate rural placements have had a positive influence on students' intention to work rurally, this intention has been measured immediately after exposure to rural practice and might not reflect future intentions.
Conclusion: This review highlights significant gaps in the impact particularly of a rural curriculum and rural clinical placements in relation to the current rural pharmacist workforce. A greater understanding of this topic may guide recommendations for future strategies to address rural pharmacy workforce maldistribution.
Keywords: intention; pharmacists; pharmacy practice; rural and remote pharmacy; undergraduate students.
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