The Kerala-based Amrita University will soon launch the much-awaited Pharm D course which is being introduced in the country to bring the pharmacists of the country on par with international standards. The University will soon tie up with a US and Canadian university in this connection. The Pharm D course will be conducted at the University's Amrita College of Pharmacy situated at the campus of Amrita Institute of Medical Sciences (AIMS), Elamakkara, Kochi.

Amrita College of Pharmacy Principal Dr KG Revikumar said that hectic efforts are on to launch the Pharm D course at the university in this academic year itself. The university is making all efforts to tie up with the University at Buffalo, New York and another university in Canada which will be formalized soon. As these universities in these developed nations have been conducting Pharm D course for a long time, the tie up with these universities will strengthen the faculty. The university's medical director Dr Prem Nair is leaving for New York on June 25 to work out further modalities for the tie up, Dr Revikumar said.

The university is planning to enroll around 25 students for the first batch of Pharm D course which will be launched in this academic year. Amrita university will be among the handful of universities in the country where this advanced pharmacy course will be launched for which the Union health ministry had recently given the green signal.

Dr Revikumar said that the university will not find it anything challenging to set up the infrastructure for launching the course as per the government guidelines as the university has several years of experience in pharma education. It is already conducting D Pharm, B Pharm, M Pharm and PHD programmes.

As far as other infrastructures are concerned, the university is well equipped to meet all the parameters to start the course as the AIMS campus already has a 1000-bed hospital and a medical college with super specialties and post-graduate programmes. One of the major conditions for starting the Pharm.D programme is the tie-up with any hospital or own hospital with more than 300-bed capacity. Other prerequisites included advanced teaching faculty, building infrastructure and prior permission from the Pharmacy Council of India (PCI).

Plus 2 students with science as main subject are eligible to join this course which will have validity all over the world including advanced countries like US, UK, etc. For the students who have already completed B Pharm course can join the Pharm.D (post baccalaureate) course. The duration of the Pharm D course will be for 6 academic years (5 years of study and 1 year internship/residency). In the one year internship, a student is exposed to actual pharmacy practice/clinical pharmacy services and acquires skill under supervision so that he/she may become capable of functioning independently.

Minimum qualifications for admission to Pharm.D course: (1) should be a pass in 10+2 examination with physics and chemistry as compulsory subjects along with one of the following subjects: mathematics/biology/bio-technology/computer science; (2) A pass in D.Pharm course from an institution approved by the PCI u/s 12 of the Pharmacy Act, 1948; and (3) any other qualification approved by the Pharmacy Council of India as equivalent to any of the above examination. For Pharm.D (post baccalaureate) course one should be B.Pharm from an institution approved by the PCI u/s 12 of the Pharmacy Act.

Institutions running B.Pharm programme approved under section 12 of the Pharmacy Act, 1948 will only be permitted to run Pharm D programme. Pharm D (Post Baccalaureate) programme will be permitted only in those Institutions which are running Pharm.D programme.