Refinement and validation of the student perceptions of physician-pharmacist interprofessional clinical education instrument

Objective. To refine the Student Perceptions of Physician-Pharmacist Interprofessional Clinical Education (SPICE) instrument to address deficiencies observed in previous studies and to demonstrate external validity and reliability of the refined instrument in a broad population of medical and pharmacy students. Methods. The original SPICE instrument plus four pilot items generated via cognitive interviewing of students was administered to 1708 medical and pharmacy students at five academic institutions. Exploratory factor analysis was used to identify candidate model structures and evaluate their psychometric properties. Results. An improved version of the instrument was created (SPICE 2) by incorporating three pilot items and removing three original items. Validity and reliability were demonstrated. Conclusion. The SPICE 2 instrument addresses the limitations observed to date in model structure while increasing its utility. The authors recommend use of the SPICE 2 instrument moving forward.