Assessing Mental Health Stigma Between Rural and Urban Pharmacists

Abstract

Objectives: To explore whether rural pharmacists express more stigmatized attitudes towards patients with psychiatric disorders, compared to their urban counterparts. Methods: Data was collected from participants attending the AzPA Southwestern Clinical Pharmacy Seminar during a weekend in February, 2015, using a questionnaire adapted from the Mental Illness: Clinicians’ Attitudes (MICA) Scale v4. The questionnaire consisted of demographic and attitude assessment questions regarding patients suffering from psychiatric disorders across different domains (quality of life, fear of patients, admitting to having a psychiatric disorder, and more). Participants were also asked if they would be interested in taking a continuing education course on mental health. Results: The majority of participants that completed the study were women (75%) and identified racially as white (89%). Pharmacists practice settings were as follows: 79% of pharmacists worked in urban areas and 21% in rural areas. Rural pharmacists displayed significantly higher rates of stigmatized attitudes compared to their urban peers (mean scale score 37.65 vs. 40.15, p=0.049). Conclusions: Pharmacists that practice in rural settings expressed more stigmatized attitudes, compared to their urban counterparts, towards patients diagnosed with psychiatric disorders.