Pharmacy education in Karnataka has seen an upsurge with a large number of students keen to opt for B Pharm after the Pre University. There has been an increase of 40 per cent of students in the last three years opting for pharmacy courses instead of basic sciences with combinations of chemistry, botany and zoology.

Karnataka has a major chunk of colleges offering pharmacy courses. While in India there are 346 colleges offering D Pharma, the state has 90 colleges offering the same. Out of the 145 pharmacy colleges in the country offering B Pharma, 45 are in Karnataka. All the colleges are registered to the Rajiv Gandhi University of Health Sciences. Thirteen out of the 45 colleges offering B Pharma conduct post graduation in pharmacy in the State offering specialisations in pharma marketing, hospital pharmacy, community pharmacy, clinical pharmacy, formulation development of new molecules, biotechnology and gene therapy.

Sources from the Rajiv Gandhi University of Health Sciences (RGHUS) stated that there is a lot of awareness on the scope of the speciality that can offer jobs for candidates in the pharma-biotech industries, hospitals and research institutes. In the last three years the number of entrants in B Pharm is at least 40 per cent higher than the previous years. There are around 90 pharmacy colleges in Karnataka and only one is a government run institution known as the Government College of Pharmacy. On an average there are 60 seats for B Pharm and six seats each for six specialties of M Pharm in the colleges that offer these courses. In many colleges the number of students opting for D Pharm is equal to the degree seats.

In the US, pharmacy is a leading profession with over 20, 000 vacancies annually. From Karnataka alone, in the last two years, atleast 30 per cent of the graduates, around 10 per cent of the post graduates and doctorates have taken on jobs in the US, stated professors from Government College of Pharmcy, Al-Ameen College, Dayanand College of Pharmacy, GM College of Pharmacy.

The pharmaceutical industry in the State is on a manpower hunt in the areas of pharmacology, research, pharma product marketing, validation, computer-aided drug design, biopharmaceutical testing, protein chemistry, documentation like handling of US FDA and other inspections and Bioinformatics.

Most fresh pharmacy graduates take up jobs in manufacture, research, marketing, management, purchase departments of pharma-biotech industry. After a 12-month intensive training they understand the industry after which they move on to specific assignments, informed officials from AstraZeneca Pharma India, Micro Labs, Bal Pharma and Biocon.

The RGHUS has introduced the community pharmacy and clinical pharmacy in the B Pharm and M Pharm syllabus during 2002-2003. The main aim is to provide a theoretical exposure to hospital and retail outlets said Prof. BG Shivananda, principal, Al-Ameen College of Pharmacy.

In the wake of heated discussion on the need for D Pharm, the RGHUS has decided to offer the new subject so that students can have the knowledge and if need be specialise the subject for M Pharm, stated sources from RGHUS.

About six years back RGHUS introduced Pharmacy practise in B Pharm which provided an industry oriented theoretical exposure, now with the expanding career opportunities, the colleges are making efforts to introduce newer combinations to suit the industry requirements, stated Prof. M Lakshmana, principal, Government College of Pharmacy and former dean of faculty at the RGHUS.

The standard of pharmacy education in the state is good. Students from leading pharmacy colleges in Bangalore like the Al-Ameen, Government Pharmacy College, Dayanand Pharmacy College, GM College of Pharmacy are selected on the campus by companies and many go abroad, stated the placement officials representing the colleges.

The present syllabus has helped students find jobs easily in the drugs controller department, industry and academia, he said. But the revised syllabus will give a further impetus to secure jobs as hospital pharmacists, Clinical pharmacy trails or quality control, marketing, research programmes and administration in the pharmaceutical or biotechnology industry, said Prof. Lakshmana.