|
· Thalidomide
· Retention fee
· Community pharmacy
· Which? report
· CPD
· Ramipril
· Canesten Combi
· Careers supplement
· The Journal
Letters to the Editor
|
Which? report
Society did the right thing
From Mr J. Saltman
There are few things a good television interviewer likes better than
the voice of authority denying the undeniable. It enables the inquisitor
to ask question after question, gnawing away at the subject and leaving
the poor interviewee more and more desperately, trying to defend that
which is manifestly wrong.
I speak from some authority having been a producer on Panorama for over
five years and both a producer and the editor of Thames Television’s
programme This Week.
In an earlier PJ (21 February, p214), the editor of Which? made it quite
plain that while his methodology may not have been to the liking of Messrs
Abrahams, Cane and Cohen (PJ, 14 February, p183) it was defendable to
all normal readers, and on radio and television, to listeners and viewers.
The audience at home accepts the credentials of a magazine like Which?
and to attack its research would, I believe, have looked as if you were
blaming the messenger for the message.
The fault, as Shakespeare wrote, “is not in our stars, but in ourselves
that we are underlings”.
David Pruce did the right thing entirely in accepting the results of
the Which? survey and in doing so he blocked off further questions. He
was then able to move the interview on to the more positive area of all
the things pharmacists get right and of the enormous trust most members
of the public have in their community pharmacist.
It is only when an interviewee has accepted that bit of mea culpa and
then drawn a line under it that the perceptive interviewer will then
allow the interview to develop.
The proof of the pudding lies in the fact that on all three of the occasions
that I saw and recorded David Pruce’s news appearances, after accepting
the allegations made by Which?, the story then went on to be constructive
about pharmacy.
Finally can I add that trying to find out the specific pharmacists who
did little credit to the profession in the Which? report is not really
the point. They are just the symptoms. The Society’s commitment
to continuing professional development and to encouraging all pharmacists
to achieve the highest standards in serving the public is the solution
to the problem.
Jack Saltman
Media Trainer to the Royal Pharmaceutical Society
|
The
Pharmaceutical Journal