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EDITORIAL

The Year in Review

Consultant Pharmacist Control
Neil Johnston

The recent debate regarding consultant pharmacists, and who should control their destinies, has raised a number of issues.
Philosophically, and derived from my second profession of management consulting, I am opposed to any organisation (business or political) that sets out to control consulting activity, unless it is an organisation specifically set up solely for the purpose of promoting, developing and professionally protecting consultant pharmacists.
Realistically, consultant pharmacists have needed the nurture, guidance and support from the Pharmaceutical Society of Australia (PSA) and the Pharmacy Guild of Australia (PGA), through the Australian Association of Consultant Pharmacists (AACP), to make the proposition viable and sustainable. The perspective of how both those organisations view the development of consultant pharmacy and the ultimate control of its destiny, is extremely important to get right, and the concerns raised by interested pharmacists are valid.
Those concerns should be taken on board by the respective organisations.

Dispensing Care Through Simplicity
Rollo Manning

A simple dispensing program has been developed by Webstercare in Sydney for remote Aboriginal communities.
This is possible because the PBS to the clinics does not require identification of the client to whom supplies are made.
Section 85 (mainstream PBS) dispensing is full of rules and regulation thus adding to the cost.
If only a scheme such as that described below could be followed elsewhere.

The War in Australia for Vaccines:
Community Pharmacies after two
losses over Influenza and Meningococcus C
Con Berbatis

Immunisation is the oldest and most efficient form of primary prevention provided by health workers (Wolfe & Sharpe, 2002; Salisbury et al, 2002).
For decades Australia’s pharmacies have stored and dispensed vaccines listed in the Pharmaceutical Benefits Schedule (PBS).
The value of all PBS vaccines supplied by Australia’s pharmacies has risen by 17.6% to $14.482 million in 30 June 2002 .
This equates to $3000 yearly for each registered pharmacy.
Vaccination usually entails two visits to doctors who prescribe and administer the vaccines and once to pharmacies for dispensing.
The cost of three professional fees and the low under-40% rate of influenza immunisation found in the high risk over-65 years group (Table 1) forced governments into changes to this three-step consumer process.

Doom, gloom and the end of life as we know it?
Ken Stafford

Returning home recently from spending a month touring the UK and Ireland, attempting, unsuccessfully at times, to ignore pharmacy and pharmacists, I was interested to read two papers in The Pharmacy Journal bemoaning where British pharmacy is heading.
In the November 9th issue, Lloyd Matowe asks “How should the profession respond to pharmacy’s poor public image? followed by Hermant Patel’s call to “Wake up! Community pharmacy could be on the path to oblivion, unless we take action now.” November 16th.

Rural and Remote Workforce Development Program
Karalyn Huxhagen

In last months E-Magazine, Simon Rudderham commented on the advertising campaign that has been featured on regional television, advertising Pharmacy as a great career choice.
Simon also referred to another program that allows access to funding for students in more regional pharia zones to attend education programs, conferences etc.
There were a few anomalies in this article that I would like to clarify.

HELP is Getting Closer
Pat Gallagher

“Health electronically long-standing promises”, HELP, is a corny acronym to introduce a serious and somewhat good-news summary of where-we-is and where-we- aren’t, in the landscape of the journey to embrace the Internet, in a practical, affordable and acceptable manner for the Australian healthcare sector.

How Do You Measure Up
Peter Sayers

With cognitive services becoming more significant in a pharmacy offering, a review of the management of total services must become a regular feature of a pharmacy, to ensure that all services, not just the new services, are sustainable, and are able to develop and thrive.
Part of that review must include a process whereby a balance is struck between operations management and quality management.
Services must be able to be managed through a total organisational approach, which ensures that the quality of service, as perceived by the patient/customer becomes the major driving force for business operations.

Second National Report on Patient Safety:
Improving Medication Safety
Karalyn Huxhagen

The document ‘Second National Report on Patient Safety: Improving Medication Safety’ produced by the Australian Council for Safety and Quality in Health Care is a wake up call for us all. Many people have commented that this paper only applies to hospital Pharmacy. This is not so.

Postcards From The Coalface
Stephen Rogers

Each year, towards Christmas, I assess where I am, both in business and personally.
Is the Pharmacy performing well?
Am I happy doing what I am doing and do feel I feel useful?
So important that.

Practical Placements in Pharmacy Training
Greg Duncan

Practical placements, case and problem based learning and other experiential practices are integral to the curricula of many schools of pharmacy today as well as a feature of pre-registration training programs.
Monash University conducted a symposium on 'Experiential Teaching and Learning in Pharmacy' in September this year to explore this topic.
This symposium presented an opportunity for academics, preceptors, supervisors and students to explore and share the experience of novel teaching in pharmacy around the world.

Medicare Card Fiasco
Simon Rudderham

Ten numbers, one sub numerate, and one hell of a lot of trouble.
Medicare Card details must be checked because, apparently, there are a significant number of people claiming medication entitlements and subsidies to which they are not entitled.
We have all heard stories of patients being stopped at airports carrying thousands of dollars of subsidized insulins and antihypertensives.
But is it such a problem that many hours need to be spent by pharmacists and pharmacy staff?

A Year’s Perspective: Progressing the QUM Agenda in a Division of General Practice
Heather Pym

If time is gathering pace, as it must be when I look back and see how close January 2002 feels, then the acceptance and role of QUM in the medical and public arena is surely keeping up.
The challenges and rewards of working in this area as a pharmacist with General Practitioners have been many in the past twelve months.

Empowering the Customer
Brett Clark

Recently our organisation introduced a continuous improvement philosophy in order to increase quality, and empower our staff to take ownership of the business through the decisions they make.
By rewarding the best idea each month, ePharmacy was successful in savings costs, creating participative decision making, and more importantly, ceasing the desire to implement change before it had been ratified in day-to-day operations.

The Last Word- Turn 360 Degrees at the Crossroads
Ayron Teed

This preamble is an invitation from the Rainbow Community Pharmacy and the Jeparit Depot to join in a special celebration to attest to the fact that despite the odds, this unique pharmacy conglomerate has managed to provide an excellent and expanding health service to a rural community.
You are invited to drop in at the Rainbow Pharmacy or the depot in Jeparit on Friday, 6th December at any time during the day, and say g'day.
Or you might prefer the sausage sizzle at Yurunga in the evening from 6.30 pm onwards.
Contact Rainbow Pharmacy by telephoning 03 539 51023, or if you are passing by, find your way to 6 Federal Street, Rainbow, Victoria.
We would love to share our celebration with you, and demonstrate the achievements noted in the article following.

APPENDIX TO THIS ISSUE

Some late breaking issues for consideration

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