Roderick Salenga, Arianne Diane Aninon
Continuing Professional Education (CPE) is a concept which has evolved from the need to find a better platform for professionals to face the challenge of keeping themselves up-to-date with new knowledge, discoveries, and skills in order to perform better in their professions. The study aims to identify barriers to lifelong learning among Filipino pharmacists that deter them to participate in related activities. A survey conducted among attendees of the Philippine Pharmacists Association-provided CPE seminars in 2012 ranked the barriers to lifelong learning. Using odds ratio to identify the confounding demographic variables, logistic regression was employed to analyze the barriers that predict a pharmacist’s attendance to CPE and National Convention. Further analysis stratified respondents according to their attendance to the local CPE in the previous year. The top barrier to lifelong learning is scheduling; negative experience with prior learning when still in college for attending CPE; and family constraints for the National Convention. In attending their local CPE in 2011, the lack of career advancement opportunities and ineffective speakers and facilitators ranked first for attendees and non-attendees, respectively. The barriers presented recurring factors such as time, family, professional advancement and cost.
