Conducted Nationwide Survey and Data Analysis Conducted a nationwide survey and data analysis

March 16, 2026

Conducted Nationwide Survey and Data Analysis
Support for Developing a Quality Indicator for Community Pharmacists' Interpersonal Services

Support for Developing a Quality Indicator for Community Pharmacists' Interpersonal Services

On March 16, 2026, as part of a Health and Labour Sciences Research Grant project, the 'Regulatory Science Policy Research Program for Pharmaceuticals and Medical Devices,' we conducted a nationwide survey and data analysis together with Associate Professor Maho Taguchi of the Regulatory Science Laboratory at Yokohama University of Pharmacy to develop an indicator for evaluating the quality of interpersonal services provided by community pharmacists.

In recent years, community pharmacists have increasingly been expected to strengthen interpersonal services in addition to dispensing, including medication guidance, patient communication, ongoing follow-up, and interprofessional collaboration. Developing indicators that appropriately capture and objectively evaluate the quality of practice is therefore an important challenge for improving healthcare quality and informing system design.

In this initiative, we designed a survey targeting community pharmacists nationwide and collected data to understand actual practice and challenges. We then performed statistical and content analysis on the collected data to organize the elements that make up the quality of interpersonal services and supported preparation of foundational materials for indicator development.

Research of this kind is meaningful not only for making the expertise of community pharmacists visible but also for advancing education and training, improving operations, and informing future health policy. Scientifically organizing interpersonal work carried out in practice and translating it into a form that can be evaluated is important for the future development of pharmacy and pharmacist services.

We will continue providing integrated support from survey design and questionnaire administration through statistical analysis, qualitative analysis, and report preparation, contributing to the social implementation of research findings.

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#MHLWResearch #RegulatoryScience #CommunityPharmacists #InterpersonalServices #QualityIndicator #NationwideSurvey #DataAnalysis #StatisticalAnalysis #QuestionnaireSurvey #ResearchSupport #HealthPolicy #PharmacyResearch

Reference:Regulatory Science Policy Research Program for Pharmaceuticals and Medical Devices