PharmaViP - UNRF

The Impact of Virtual Patients in Pre-Clinical Pharmacology Learning in Diverse Learners

Project Overview

The research project entitled ‘The Impact of Virtual Patients in Pre-Clinical Pharmacology Learning in Diverse Learners (PharmaViP) is funded under the Excellence Hubs (EXCELLENCE/0524) programme within the “RESTART 2016-2020” funding framework for Research, Technological Development and Innovation (RTDI) from the Cyprus Research and Innovation Foundation. It received a competitive €119,756.00 grant. The project consortium consists of the University of Nicosia Research Foundation (UNRF), as the project host organisation, and Örebro University, Sweden, as the foreign research partner organisation. The project started in May 2025 and will be completed in April, 2027.

Medication errors are a global healthcare issue partially attributed to inadequate pharmacology knowledge. Even though active learning methodologies, including virtual patients (VPs), flipped classroom (FC) and problem-based learning (PBL) have been implemented in medical education to address the limitations of passive learning, they are poorly characterized as teaching modalities in pre-clinical pharmacology learning. The proposed project aims to investigate the potential benefits of integrating VPs in pharmacology education within discipline-based and PBL medical curricula in diverse learners. VPs will be incorporated in a FC format in the Systematic Pharmacology course in a discipline-based medical curriculum, comparing it to traditional lecture-based learning. VPs will also be delivered in PBL-based medical programmes, either as in-class tutorials or as an independent learning resource, and the effects will be compared. A quasi-experimental design will be used to assess the following outcomes in the two comparator groups: pharmacological knowledge, student perceptions and satisfaction, cognitive load, student motivation and engagement. Collectively, our findings will allow us to identify which pedagogical approach is more effective to support learning in pharmacology. The project aims to improve pharmacology education, potentially contributing to the reduction of medication errors and enhancing patient safety in the long term.

Please refer to the link below for our previously funded project (PharmPBL) and work, which has informed the present study.

PharmPBL