The profession of pharmacy has experienced significant development over the past decades. While responsibilities vary among the different setting areas, the ultimate concern of the pharmacy is to ensure the safe, effective and appropriate use of medicines. It is a profession that focuses on improving the quality of people's lives. It has been recognized as an important profession in the multidisciplinary provision of health care.
The pharmacist’s involvement in medicines extends from development of medicines, their quality control, marketing and distribution, dispensing to patients against a prescription, selling medicines (mainly OTC products) to patients and consumers, and counselling of patients as to how to best take the medicines. Pharmacists may work in hospital providing a range of services including medicine information. Pharmacists need to work in academia, and also in government agency in regulating and controlling use of medicines. The pharmacy profession is continuously evolving and continues to evolve, as pharmacists are increasingly evolved to be pharmaceutical specialists in public health. These changes need to be analysed on how pharmacy professionals are educated and trained, what they learn vis-à-vis situation in India.
Pharmacy basic degree: The length of study to basic degree (in pharmacy) attainment varies, and is generally four years, with longer duration in the US (6 years), France ( 6 years), Canada (5 years) and in many countries of their Pharm D program (albeit may not be a basic degree). A four year undergraduate basic degree is an option exists in many developed countries viz. the United Kingdom, Singapore, Germany, Australia, and New Zeeland. Many countries require clinical training, generally four months to one year, either during the course of study or as a post-graduation internship or residency (Table 1). Hence, the opinion of a section of people that PharmD program has become a global program available in almost all countries is not true.
Rightly, the WHO UNESCO FIP Pharmacy Education Taskforce defines pharmacy education as “the educational design and capacity to develop the workforce for a diversity of settings (e.g. community, hospital, research and development, academia) across varying levels of service provision and competence (e.g. technical support staff, pharmacists and pharmaceutical scientists) and scope of education (e.g. undergraduate, postgraduate, lifelong learning)”.
Pharmacy professionals in India: The demand for graduates with a pharmacy education is growing steadily with the simultaneous rapid growth of pharmaceutical industries in India and outsourcing of drug clinical trial and bioequivalence studies of generics from abroad. The pharmacy education in India has four levels: 2 year Diploma in Pharmacy (DPharm), 4 year Bachelor of Pharmacy (BPharm), 2 year Master of Pharmacy (MPharm), and 6 year Pharm D courses. The entry point, for DPharm, BPharm and PharmD programs, is 12 years of formal school education in the science (starting students are approximately 18 years of age).
Bachelor of Pharmacy (BPharm) is the degree offered in all Indian universities (Table 2). Although the Pharm D program started 5 years ago however, the program still lacks the acknowledgement across the length and breadth of the country as a professional certification that is different from the dominant bachelor and diploma programs. Over the past few years, in addition to BPharm/ MPharm degree holders, pharmaceutical companies have recruited Diploma holders for various supplementary works. Additionally even failed diploma candidates are getting recruited in industries. Aside from this recently I understand, through Face Book postings, pharmacy graduates are being placed in IT companies. Placements seem to be based on ability of candidates and employers’ needs rather than graduates of approved institutions.
Adapting educational system for pharmacists: We have learned from the fact that value in society is no longer a tangible product but knowledge based. No single pharmacy program will have a monopoly in guaranteeing that the use of medicine leads to the desired objective.Quality considerations in education and training make a critical difference in determining the future. Times have changed and so have the role of the pharmacist. The changing role of pharmacists necessitate changes in the ways we provide pharmacy education and training. An involvement a knowledgeable pharmacist in medicine therapy is essential to help rational use of medicines, eliminate medication errors, eliminate preventable adverse events and make proper medication management. For this, education and training for pharmacists has to be adapted.
(The author is Associate Professor, Department of Pharmacy,
Annamalai University, Annmalainagar , Tamilnadu)