The Pharmaceutical Journal
Vol 273 No 7310 p150
31 July 2004

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· Shipman inquiry
· Broad spectrum
· Public health
· Violence in pharmacies
· Pharmacy education
· Tablet identification
· Natural therapies
· Nasal sprays
· Dispensing
· The profession
· The Council
· The Society

Letters to the Editor

The profession

Faced with a grim and clouded future

From Mr C. Chapman

As a preregistration trainee having just finished my first six-month placement in community pharmacy, I feel disgusted and demoralised by the lack of unity in pharmacy today. As far as I can see pharmacy is dogged by bureaucracy and paperwork and has an uncertain future that, although painted to be rosy by the Royal Pharmaceutical Society’s Council and the NHS, in reality will be marred with red tape and pay cuts. Although I enjoy the course at the University of Bradford, and have enjoyed the dispensing and pharmaceutical aspects of my placement, the omnipresent need for pointless records and documentation (by which I mean continuing professional development updates and NHS forms, and not the important Controlled Drugs and POM registers) has left me questioning if I have wasted three years of my life in preparing to enter a profession that cannot agree among itself, let alone take a modern outlook.

My friends at university have already graduated with jobs that involve better pay, shorter hours, less legislation, and less need to pander to directives from a government that cannot make up its mind on the correct approach. The NHS is in disarray, and I fear this will only get worse by the time I graduate, since pharmacy is increasingly being called upon to take on more and more responsibilities without an increase in benefits.

I feel as though the new pharmacy contract is something to be feared and met with derision, and my prospective career outlook is bleak indeed. I chose a career in pharmacy because I believed it to be about serving the community and not about being distracted by other tasks that make counselling patients unfeasible. At present I do not believe a pharmacist in a busy pharmacy can realistically meet all the demands that will soon be imposed, and will lead only to an increase in stress and a decrease in performance.

I only hope that my hospital placement reveals some gleam of hope in an otherwise grim and clouded future or I may embark on a new, different career, with a pharmacy degree of little use. In short, I feel that community pharmacy is going down the drain in a flood of documents and targets, and I do not wish to be washed down with it.

Christopher Chapman
Pharmacy Undergraduate,
University of Bradford

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