The Pharmaceutical Journal
Vol 278 No 7434 insert
13 January 2007

This article
Reprint   Photocopy

PDF 170K, Acrobat Reader

What will the creation of the national pharmacy boards mean for the branches and regions?

David Carter and John Gentle, Council sponsors for the Royal Pharmaceutical Society's branch and regional network, discuss the role of the national pharmacy boards and their relationship with the branch and regional network

Network News summary

The new year will ring in some significant changes for the Royal Pharmaceutical Society with the establishment of national pharmacy boards for England, Scotland and Wales as from 21 January. But how will the new boards interact with the branch and regional network?

The answer is that we do not yet know but it is important that the network plays its part in forging important new relationships with the boards.

Why do we need the new boards? They will help the Society to maximise the opportunities that devolution offers, allowing it to represent the profession fully at the highest level in government in England, Scotland and Wales and ensure that in any health context the Society is a key player in the development of policies that have implications for the pharmacy profession and patients.

What will the boards do? They will:

• Provide strategic leadership and support for pharmacy practice development in each country

• Assist the development of Council policy and its implementation in each country and develop and implement policy specific to each country

• Promote the science and practice of pharmacy and its contribution to health

• Provide professional advice to government and its agencies, NHS bodies and other health and social care organisations in each country

• Support the Society’s branches

• Support pharmacists in their professional roles

The boards will bring the Society closer to the membership but, to achieve this successfully, it will be important for them to interact with the branches and, in England, the regions. How these relationships are developed will be a key decision for each board to make, and the branches and regions can help inform the boards’ thinking by sending representatives to attend meetings in order to better understand the boards’ direction of travel. Branches and regions will be invited to send observers to the national board meetings in the same way that they are invited to observe meetings of the Council and its committees.