Pharmacology is included in a wide range of courses, including those for scientists training for the pharmaceutical industry and academic research, as well as health professions such as medicine, osteopathy, dentistry, veterinary science, pharmacy, nursing, midwifery, paramedics, physician assistants, podiatry, chiropractic, and dietetics. Some health professionals will go on to prescribe drugs, and these students will need additional knowledge about certain drug classes as well as the ability to apply clinical reasoning to real-world scenarios. By contrast, life scientists may focus more on the mechanistic detail or predicting potential drug targets’ usefulness. Clearly, each of these groups will require teaching strategies that inspire engagement [54]. Nevertheless, the core concepts identified through this project could form the basis for all these courses.
It is important to consider how to make core concepts relevant and applicable for different student cohorts. This may involve using example drugs contextualised in case-based learning. However, the approach may mean varying the levels of detail and distinct pedagogical approaches. For example, the core concept of structure-activity relationship (SAR) can be treated in a brief and fundamental manner, using the development of salbutamol from the chemical structure of adrenaline as an example, thus focusing on the clinical benefits of salbutamol over adrenaline. On the other hand, students potentially training for a career in drug discovery would require a greater understanding of structure-activity relationships, which could be obtained through more complex examples and the use of virtual reality or 3D computer simulations [55]. (Figure 3) shows an example of the adaptation of core concepts to specific teaching contexts.