The Pharmaceutical Journal
Vol 274 No 7349 p584
14 May 2005

This article
Reprint   Photocopy

PDF 100K, Acrobat Reader

· The Society (9)
· Birdsgrove House
· Reciprocal registration
· NAWP (2)
· Pharmacy technicians
· Community pharmacy
· Statutory Committee
· Internet sites
· Complementary medicine
· Pharmacy graduates
· RFID pilot
· CPD

Letters to the Editor

Pharmacy graduates

Concerned by the quality and quantity of pharmacy students

From Mr R. Duncombe, MRPharmS

I, like a number of colleagues, am becoming increasingly concerned by the quality and quantity of students coming out of UK schools of pharmacy. At the last round of interviews for preregistration places, I struggled to find four candidates who I thought would become good pharmacists, and who would be able to develop the range of professional skills required of a pharmacist. There was no problem with the quantity of applications I received; however, many of the applicants were unable to communicate clearly and had little understanding of the modern NHS or pharmacy practice.

Similarly, I have recently been deluged by students wanting vacation employment — in excess of 50 applicants for unpaid work. When I asked each applicant to pen a few lines about the recent review of pharmacist prescribing (in order to make an informed judgement about who to take on) only five bothered to respond. Unfortunately, I feel that this is symptomatic of the type of student who now undertakes further education — they have high expectations of their employer aligned with a need for spoon-feeding, yet when asked to be self-motivated they are often found to be lacking.

I am concerned that many of the pharmacy schools are now selling an impossible dream. If the quality of the output is poor employers will not take on the graduates for preregistration training. In a few years there will be significant numbers of pharmacy graduates who will never be able to register as pharmacists because they have neither the skills nor the attitudes necessary to become professional pharmacists.

Rob Duncombe
Witham, Essex

Send your letter to The Editor

Previous Topic (Complementary medicine)
Next Topic (RFID pilot)