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	The Pharmaceutical Journal Vol 270 No 7253 p825 14 June 2003	This page Reprint Photocopy
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CPD

Proposals strike at the Society's foundation

From Dr R. C. Moreton, MRPharmS

The Royal Pharmaceutical Society's continuing professional development proposals strike at the very foundation of our Society and its institutions. Besides losing members, as I believe we will, we could see the demise of the British Pharmaceutical Conference and the demise of the academic pharmacist. I would even venture to suggest that it may cause problems for those members who work for the Society at Lambeth.

The BPC appears to be disproportionately supported by attendees from the industrial sector and academia through the relationship with the Academy of Pharmaceutical Sciences. If industrial pharmacists leave the Society in numbers, will there be pressure on the academy to sever the link with the conference? Without the support of the academy, how viable is the conference?

If the Society is going to be a two-tiered membership, with community and hospital pharmacists making the active members and then the rest becoming second class citizens, as it were, what is the point of industrial pharmacists like myself remaining members? Some will try to meet the requirements, but many of us living overseas will find it difficult. Will academic pharmacists suffer the same fate? What does this mean for the future of pharmacy training, especially with the new schools that are to open? Where will we find the pharmacists for the courses that are mandated to be given or supervised by pharmacists? I do not think that community and hospital pharmacists working on a part-time basis is a long-term solution.

And then we have the pharmacists working at Society headquarters. Will they be able to meet the requirements for membership of the register of active members? Our Secretary and Registrar was for many years a hospital pharmacist, but not now. The Society can always engineer the rules to accommodate certain groups, but too many accommodations may lead to legal action by other groups to try to obtain the same kinds of accommodation.

There is an old saying that a camel is a horse designed by a committee. Sadly, I believe the new proposals inspire neither myself, nor many of my colleagues. I think we need to throw out these divisive proposals and start again. Being a pharmacist is both about our academic training and about an attitude of mind that the patient comes first and that we are there to provide a service for patients. I am a pharmacist who works in industry. I believe I serve the patient just as much as the next pharmacist. I know that I engage in CPD almost daily; I would not have survived in industry without continuing to learn and develop myself professionally. If, as I believe under the proposals, we will see the end of the industrial pharmacist as a member of our Society, then I think the Society and the membership will be the long-term losers. United we stand; divided we fall.

Chris Moreton
Waltham, Massachusetts,
United States

Dr Robert Dewdney, head of education, Royal Pharmaceutical Society, replies:

Perhaps Dr Moreton has not read the original proposals paper (PJ, 8 February) or the outcome (PDF 55K) of the consultation with the membership (PJ, 29 March, pp456–7) or the report of Council and the accompanying frequently asked questions (PJ, 17 May, pp699–703). Pharmacist academics and pharmacists in the industry will be regarded just as much practising pharmacists as anyone else on the practising part of the future register.

I would repeat my words in response to K. M. Youings' letter of last week (PJ, 7 June, p793): Dr Moreton "is under a misapprehension that someone at the Society has made a policy distinction between patient care (community and hospital) and other forms of pharmacy practice and science. In fact, as has been clearly and repeatedly stated in the PJ, the Council has consciously eschewed such a distinction."

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