EDITORIAL

On the 24th, 25th and 26th March 2004, a major conference and workshop embracing the entire Pharmaceutical Industry, is being staged.
It is titled "The Australian Pharmaceuticals Summit" and a full program is available at the link on the front page of this e-magazine.
For all who can attend, it should prove to be a stimulating and entertaing three days.

Representing community pharmacy will be Jay Hooper, National President of the Pharmaceutical Society of Australia, and Neil Johnston, editor of this e-magazine.
My topic is "Assessing the pharmacy market: Time to restructure?".

The one thing that a conference of this type does, is to concentrate and distil your thoughts, because after all, you are delivering to a high-level audience, and you want to get it right.

In researching the topic, it became glaringly evident that excessive dispensing volume was the single big pharmacy issue, with its management problems impeding forward momentum, particularly in the introduction of new cognitive services.
Its impact reverberates through other serious problems, such as a lack of pharmacists and the retention of retiring pharmacists, because there is no interesting work and it is too tiring!

Most of our writers are back on stream after the vacation period, and are settling in to a range of very interesting issues.
I would point readers to a late comer in the form of James Delahunty.
James has some good information on the digital photo imaging market, and this is an activity that pharmacists should be aware of, and be actively involved in.

Rollo Manning, Ken Stafford and Con Berbatis weigh in with very diverse articles, and I would point you in Con's direction as he researches community pharmacy and the HIV/AIDS community.
Pat Gallagher is back with his informed IT commentary, Karalyn Huxhagen talks about recognition of pharmacy assistants and Catherine Bronger has an interesting slant on a student issue.

Heather Pym, Val Johanson and Simon Rudderham also have some interesting tales to tell.

With the Fourth Community Pharmacy Agreement negotiations under way, everyone is becoming a little anxious as to the outcome. i2P will endeavour to keep readers informed on all issues surrounding this agreement.
All previous agreements have all been important to pharmacy, but this one could go down as the most important.

Neil Johnston
March 2004

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