The Pharmaceutical Journal
Vol 270 No 7254 p871-872
21 June 2003

Society summary

From the President

Working together for a brighter future

While respecting each other's views and positions, pharmacists must work together for a brighter future, making the most of the opportunities available to the profession, says Dr Gillian Hawksworth

I begin my term as President of the Royal Pharmaceutical Society knowing that we have to achieve a great many things for the profession in the course of the next year. It goes without saying that I am proud and privileged to have been elected President. I do not underestimate the challenges that face me but I know that I am ready to deal with them. I have a strong team to support me and will do my utmost to help the pharmacy profession achieve the bright future it deserves.

I intend my time as President to be looked back upon as a time when people knew they could speak and be properly listened to. As a profession, I believe that we all must respect each other's genuinely held views and positions, particularly when they do not match our own. I have no difficulties with good, healthy debate. Indeed, I am impressed by the strength of feeling that pharmacists evidently have about the future of the Society. Our profession is lucky to have such enthusiasm and passion within it. As part of the programme for the reform of the Society, we want and need widespread, mature, considered debate about all the issues. The Council must try harder to ensure that as members you receive a clear unambiguous picture of what we are trying to achieve.

Listening and taking into account varied opinions is part of the decision-making process which members of Council take very seriously. Our consultation on modernisation and the new Charter is revealing many different views of a possible best future for the Society and the profession. I am confident that many of these points will be taken up in the final version of our Charter. But it follows that some points, having been carefully considered, will not be acted on and, therefore, some people may disagree with the decisions that the Council makes.

I hope that everyone will recognise that the Council has acted throughout in good faith and with the sole intention of securing the best future for the profession. I want to reassure every member that the Council has no possible intention whatsoever of removing or even reducing the Society's roles as a professional body. In fact the opposite is true: the Council wants these roles to develop and grow.

As well as being aware of the concerns about the future of the Society, I know that there are anxieties and uncertainties for pharmacists working in all areas of practice. As a former pharmacy owner and now a locum pharmacist, I understand from personal experience the stress and difficulties of everyday practice.

Pharmacy is a rewarding profession but the pace of change today can be frustrating and draining. I know that it can be a great help to have somewhere to turn to for advice and support.

I would therefore urge you all to explore and use the services that you can obtain from the Society to support your development and practice which will help deal with today's challenges. Expert technical help is available at the end of the phone to answer your day-to-day queries on all aspects of medicines and their use. You can also phone for informed advice about the law, regulations and Code of Ethics that you need to follow in your practice.

The Society is facilitating support for pharmacists' continued professional development and, of course, there is the support of local branches. For pharmacists under stress, we have a Listening Friends service, which last year helped 120 pharmacists in times of crisis and we should all be proud of our history of support to our members through the Benevolent Fund.

As well as supporting pharmacists themselves, the Society has an active role in shaping the world in which pharmacists work. The Society is — and will continue to be — a body that represents a wide range of pharmacists' concerns and issues to opinion-leaders and decision-makers. In recent years, we have placed much more emphasis on this area of activity. On your behalf, and on behalf of the public we all serve, we went to the then Minister (David Lammy) to tell him of our concerns about the risks of the mounting workload for pharmacists and how that may affect their health, well-being and ability to provide a safe, quality service. A result of that is that the Government has agreed to work with us to improve workforce planning. Over recent years, we repeatedly pointed out the shortcomings of the current contractual framework for National Health Service community pharmacy services, which it is agreed does not provide an adequate way of rewarding quality. The Council was pleased when the Government announced that there would be a new approach through a new kind of contract.

One issue where we still have much work to do is the campaign for patient packs, which we continue to press for. On a more successful note, we now have pharmacist supplementary prescribing as a reality, less than six years after we proposed it in our "Pharmacy in a new age" initiative. Of course, we cannot afford to be complacent: we still need to achieve independent prescribing and we continue to press for this important development. Other current concerns that we are communicating to the Government include the Office of Fair Trading report; the lack of pharmacists' connection to the NHS electronic network; the need for access to patient information and the need for reform of the misuse of drugs regulations.

As well as representing pharmacists' concerns to the Government, the Society has successfully secured representation for pharmacy in a range of NHS bodies, such as the National Institute for Clinical Excellence Partners Council and on the working groups for such initiatives as the National Service Framework for Diabetes and the Children's NSF. This makes sure that pharmacists have input into important national health policy planning and implementation.

The Society has established a strong reputation as a research funder and user in the field of health services research. As a result pharmacy is moving up the priority list for other research funding bodies. A significant number of pharmacy practice research teams are securing major grants from the research councils and the NHS. Several pharmacy researchers have won major training awards by competing successfully with leading researchers from medicine and nursing. Many pharmacy innovations are now being properly evaluated through national studies. The future policy agenda will, as a result, be better informed and more effective.

It is the Council's intention that we continue to develop our role as an effective voice for the pharmacy profession, ensuring that Government, the NHS and other decision-making bodies are made aware of the pharmacist's perspective.

During this year, the Council would like to hear from as many pharmacists as possible. I intend to visit as many branches and regions as I can. I have been entrusted with an important job and I believe that our profession has enormous strengths and opportunities. I am committed to work tirelessly to help our profession and make the most of its opportunities.

The Society is rightly proud of its traditions and its past — let us all work together for a brighter future.