1) We performed a questionnaire survey on "vital signs check by pharmacists" for 120 hospital pharmacists who participated in a continuing education workshop about vital signs.2) Fifty-two percent (58 of 111) of pharmacists felt that vital signs checks were necessary in the workplace, and 77% (85 of 110) of pharmacists wanted to check vital signs.3) Eighty-six percent (95 of 110) of pharmacists thought that they should learn how to check vital signs, but only 10% (11 of 110) of pharmacists had been trained how to check vital signs. Therefore, pharmacists should be given many opportunities to learn how to check vital signs.

We developed a program to generate scenarios of pathological changes for problem-based learning (PBL) in a physical assessment workshop using the patient simulator, "Physiko^®”. With these programs, PBL-style case experiencing also became possible by actually performing physical assessment on “Physiko^®” using a stethoscope while presenting information such as the patient background. The results of a survey conducted during the physical assessment workshop showed that participants were significantly interested in simulation-based education. However, the results also revealed a lack of understanding of technical terms used in physical assessment, suggesting the need to urgently facilitate not only the acquisition of basic skills to monitor vital signs but also that of symptomatology knowledge in order to understand technical terms and pathological characteristics.