..Information to Pharmacists
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Your Monthly E-Magazine
DECEMBER, 2003

TERRY IRVINE

A Pharmacy Organisational Perspective
The comments below are the author's personal thoughts and do not necessarily reflect the views of the organisation that he represents.
Are pharmacists really serious about their future as independent professionals?

It is hard not to be critical of what seems to be happening in community pharmacy.
The time limit for Quality Care Accreditation with the full compensation amount is fast approaching, and yet there is still less than 80% of pharmacies that have been accredited even once.
Some, of course, have not only been accredited once, they have been re-accredited!
They are the significant minority.
Woolworths and Coles continue to make noises about having pharmacies in their supermarkets, and there is evidence that the public would be pleased for this to happen, a survey conducted some time ago showed that what the public wanted in supermarkets were pharmacies, not as desirable as toilets, but certainly next.

In response to these threats by the big two in food retailing, more than 20% of pharmacies seem to be saying they do not care about adopting standards that would allow the public to have uniform expectations of the level of service in all pharmacies.

Would this lazy minority be as complacent if the government decided that this lack of activity warranted removal of their approval numbers?

Then there is the down-scheduling of ibuprofen.
The "West Australian" had an interesting article a few weeks ago, copies of which the Guild circulated, that indicated there was not too much intervention by pharmacists, or their staff when a six month pregnant reporter requested some Nurofen.
Remember, this is in a state where S2 products must be kept behind the counter, and customers cannot serve themselves.
Are pharmacies in the other states better because they have less restriction on where the products are stocked?
It is unlikely that they have a firm process in place to ensure there is no potential harm for customers.

Apparently at least some pharmacies in shopping complexes are struggling to make ends meet, the shopping centre operators seem to think the pharmacies are much more popular than they are and charge totally unrealistic rents.
With high rents owners must try to reduce their expenses in other ways.
The most expensive variable expense is wages and salaries; there is therefore pressure to reduce these with a consequent reduction in service.
This in turn can make the comparison between existing private pharmacies and the Guild's scaremongering of service levels from corporate pharmacies a little ludicrous.


Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year
Terry Irvine