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	The Pharmaceutical Journal Vol 271 No 7256 p13 5 July 2003	This page Reprint Photocopy
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CPD

Who can give voluntary health care advice?

From Mr D. C. Shenton, MRPharmS

A few days ago I gave a talk to a group of patients with heart disease, of whom I am one. We met in the local hospital as part of an organised programme; the meeting was essentially a private one. My speaking was voluntary. The main topic was our (ie, patients') attitudes to compliance with prescribed treatment. The audience and the organisers seemed to find what I had to say useful. I am retired and currently have no intention of joining in continuing professional development.

Although I was pleased to read recently some detail of what mandatory CPD will demand of whom, I wonder about the inclusion of voluntary activity. Clearly, no pharmacist who is "inactive" can legitimately run a dispensary for an afternoon without payment, but what else will be covered? Health care advice given in any setting at all apparently may be.

The question of whether a member is competent to take the required role would be much better left to professional conscience and judgement. That is what I would want if my general practitioner or my dentist did something professional in the voluntary sphere. My own talk was prefaced by a clear statement that I would not deal with any detailed information about specific drugs. However, I was undeniably offering health care advice in the wider sense.

When CPD sanctions finally bite, if I declare formally that I am not practising, anything I have to offer in this way may have to be permanently corked in a bottle. There must be other pharmacists in roughly similar positions, perhaps involved with a charity. Is it in the public interest to stop us contributing as volunteers concrete knowledge and the fruits of experience?

David Shenton
Staines, Middlesex

Dr ROBERT DEWDNEY, head of education, Royal Pharmaceutical Society, replies:

The Society's proposals on mandatory CPD, supported by the outcome of the recent consultation on the matter, did address the situation of pharmacists speaking or advising about pharmacy or health on a voluntary basis. This will be regarded as no different from speaking or advising about pharmacy or health in an employed or other contracted capacity, ie, the pharmacist concerned will be subject to mandatory CPD because he or she could not sustain a statement or undertaking that they were/are "non-practising".

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