The Pharmaceutical Journal
Vol 273 No 7322 p621
23 October 2004

Well written introduction to sociology aimed at pharmacy undergraduates

‘Sociology for pharmacists’, by Kevin Taylor, Sarah Nettleton and Geoffrey Harding. Pp xi+190. Price £24.99. New York: Taylor & Francis; 2003. ISBN 0 415 27488 5

The second edition of ‘Sociology for pharmacists’ is a much improved and well-constructed textbook aimed at providing an introduction to the fundamentals of sociology for undergraduate pharmacy students. One of the difficulties of undergraduate texts is to find the appropriate balance between complexity and clarity and the authors pull off this difficult balancing act with some skill. This thoroughly researched updated version contains well written chapters on basic issues in medical sociology — social inequalities and health, public perspectives and health, help-seeking behaviour and social factors and health.

I was particularly pleased to see that (unlike the first edition) there is a much greater focus on the critical dimensions of medical sociology, which is often hard to get over to undergraduate pharmacy students. Furthermore, I thought that the chapters on contemporary practice of pharmacy and the occupational status of pharmacy are admirably clear, well-written and up to date: these chapters summarise complicated material very well.

Perhaps the only criticism of the book is that the chapters on research methods do not fit as well as the earlier chapters, but this is a minor quibble.

Overall, though, I thought this was a well-written textbook with a clear market and I will certainly be recommending it to my undergraduate students.


Paul Bissell

Paul Bissell is lecturer in social pharmacy and pharmacy practice, Centre for Pharmacy, Health and Society, School of Pharmacy, University of Nottingham