The Pharmaceutical Journal
Vol 278 No 7455 p673-674
9 June 2007

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Letters to the Editor

The profession

Leadership lacking at Government level

From Mr P. Walton, MRPharmS

I have followed the discussions regarding the formation of a body akin to a royal college and have attempted to visualise how I could incorporate another revolution (rather than evolution) into my vision of a future in the pharmacy profession. I have been involved in so many “revolutions” that I am heartily sick of them.

I was among the first 16 pharmacists to prescribe emergency hormonal contraception responsibly using a patient group direction. This was revolutionary but was soon largely superseded by over-the-counter sale without the in-depth training for pharmacists that the PGD supply pharmacists received. I was among the first to supply chloramphenicol eye-drops on a PGD through a local pharmaceutical services-based initiative; that also went OTC with far less training for pharmacists. Indeed Manchester Local Pharmaceutical Services had all the potential to promote excellence in pharmacy but it ceased. The huge training input by participating pharmacists was essentially wasted.

When there were deaths attributed to the changes in oxygen supply arrangements, a number of friends came to me saying that I was right in my prediction: the “revolutionary” change had failed with disastrous consequences. I had telephoned the primary care trust, the Pharmaceutical Services Negotiating Committee and the NHS, telling them about the difficulties some of our patients would encounter, but no one wanted to listen.

For some reason governments, since I started my career, have thought it necessary to mess around with the NHS so much that many of its staff go to work with low morale and a “could not care less where they try to take us from here” attitude, born of massive frustration.

The leadership that is lacking within the NHS is not at a professional level but at governmental level.

Philip Walton
Manchester

Pharmacists and technicians must lobby for separate bodies

From Mr M. D. Evans, MRPharmS

I write largely in response to the letter from Helen Knipe (PJ, 2 June, p643). We are moving into a new and exciting era of both regulation and representation for pharmacy, and this is an excellent opportunity for both pharmacists and technicians to establish a structure fit for purpose. Regulation of both professions can undoubtedly be undertaken by a single body; however representation should and must be carried out by separate bodies.

A joint representative body will never truly represent either pharmacists or technicians but will remain conflicted at the core, resulting in indecision and the stagnation of both professions. It is not as stated by Ms Knipe a “them and us” or “divide and conquer” position but a logical position based upon a requirement for each profession to be represented without conflict of interest. As a pharmacist I want and need a representative body to represent only pharmacists. If I were a technician I would want exactly the same thing.

It is essential that both pharmacists and technicians put aside the inflammatory writings of the past few weeks and examine this important issue of regulation, logically and without emotion as it is one which will shape our future for decades to come. I therefore urge both professions to lobby for separate bodies as that is the only way in which our professions will be adequately represented.

Mark Evans
Sidcup, Kent

Exploited as cheap labour?

From Mr A. J. Rogers, FRPharmS

The paper by Wendy Gidman et al on female pharmacists’ remuneration (PJ, 2 June, p645), cites an example of a store that paid optometrists £60,000 per annum to work from 9am to 5pm with no Saturday or Sunday work. Pharmacists are paid much less and have to work anti-social hours, with greater responsibility. Technicians are paid less than pharmacists, so when the law eventually delegates “personal control” to non-pharmacists, employers will be looking to reduce their overheads. So, in response to Helen Knipe (PJ, 2 June, p643), pharmacists do not feel threatened by technicians, but by the multiples, hospital trusts, and primary care trusts that exploit the cheap labour option.

Alan Rogers
Ewell, Surrey

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