The Pharmaceutical Journal
Vol 280 No 7496 p406-407
5 April 2008

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British Pharmaceutical Students’ Association

We should work towards pharmacists replacing doctors in prescribing roles

Pharmacists should replace doctors in the role of prescribing where there is an existing diagnosis, and it is within their professional competence to do so. This was one of the motions debated at this year’s British Pharmaceutical Students’ Association annual conference.

Proposing the motion, Gemma Donovan, a fourth-year student at Manchester, said that since pharmacists were medicines experts and doctors were diagnosis experts, it made sense for pharmacists to prescribe the appropriate medicine in accordance with a doctor’s diagnosis.

Because pharmacists spend a lot of their time checking what doctors have prescribed, it seems plausible that they could take on a full role in prescribing. Ms Donovan commended doctors’ diagnostic ability but suggested that since pharmacists are experts in medicines they would be more consistent than doctors for considering appropriate formulations, drug interactions and patient co-morbidities.

Although she accepted that, logistically, this motion was not currently workable, Ms Donovan believes that it is a position that the pharmacy profession should be working towards.

Other students, however, did not support Ms Donovan’s proposal. James Davies, secretary general for the BPSA, said: “We are pharmacists. We are not future doctors and we are not stealing the role of doctors. We, as healthcare professionals, should be working as part of a multidisciplinary team, where we work alongside doctors to form a greater healthcare service for this country.”

Elizabeth Aubrey, a third-year student from Manchester, who seconded the motion, said that the intention was not to take doctors’ roles. “Doctors are diagnosticians; that’s their job. Our job, as medicines experts, should be to prescribe.” We would be strengthening our role,” she explained. Over half of conference attendees voted in favour of the motion but the majority was not sufficient for the motion to be carried.

More advertising of summer placements needed for industrial pharmacists to survive

The pharmaceutical industry should improve the advertising of its summer placements to pharmacy students, proposed Louise Hemmings, a third-year student at the University of Bradford. Ms Hemmings said that pharmaceutical companies want pharmacy students to experience their working environment and do offer summer placements to students, but that information about how to apply for such placements is not readily available.

Tom Scott, a first-year student at Aston University, highlighted the current concerns from the pharmaceutical industry that industrial pharmacists are becoming a dying breed. He believes that improving advertising to university students would help to alleviate such concerns. It was suggested that pharmaceutical companies could visit schools of pharmacy to raise awareness of their placement schemes, in a similar way to the approach taken by some multiple community pharmacies.

With no opposition from conference attendees, the motion was carried to become BPSA policy.

Motion for paid position on BPSA executive carried

There should be a paid position on the British Pharmaceutical Students’ Association executive, provided it is financially feasible, proposed James Davies, secretary general for the BPSA. With all the uncertainties that lie in the future of the pharmacy profession, it is necessary to have one person who can provide the BPSA with total commitment.

Currently, all BPSA executive members have to balance their BPSA commitments with work and study commitments. Therefore, the members of the BPSA executive cannot be contacted at all times. Mr Davies suggested that a paid member of the executive could be contactable by telephone during working hours.

Jamie Wilkinson, a second-year student from Kingston University, commended the proposal and highlighted the fact that the International Pharmaceutical Students Federation, the European Pharmaceutical Students Association and the National Union of Students all have paid members working on their executive committees.

Graham Phillips, chairman of the Royal Pharmaceutical Society Council’s education committee, warned that employing a paid member of the executive could have unwanted implications for members of the executive who are not paid. He suggested that the BPSA might achieve a similar outcome by employing administrative staff that could be based at the Society’s headquarters and that extending the Society’s grant to the BPSA could fund such a post.

However the Council, which does not include any paid members, would be less likely to agree to fund the full-time employment of an executive member.

In response, Mr Davies argued that if a paid executive member was going to be the main BPSA contact for students, he or she should have a comprehensive understanding of BPSA policy.

Jodie Taylor, western area coordinator for the BPSA, added that any point of contact for the BPSA should be a pharmacy student, because the BPSA provides advice to pharmacy students on many issues. “This advice is better coming from somebody who has been there, rather than someone who has no pharmacy experience or has not been a student recently,” she said.

Victor Tung, a second-year student from Aston University, questioned how the BPSA planned to pay for the position. He also asked how introducing a paid position was intended to improve an executive committee that had functioned successfully on a voluntary basis for over 60 years.

In response, Alison Holmes, treasurer of the BPSA, said that the executive would only consider implementing a paid position if it were financially feasible. She added that a paid executive member would have more time to campaign on behalf of members at conferences and Society meetings, and may over time be funded by a consequential increase in subscription numbers.

Support from conference participants was sufficient to carry the motion, which now becomes part of BPSA policy. The association’s finance working party will investigate the feasibility of the proposal.

New BPSA president

James Davies, ex-Bath, was elected the next BPSA president.

Mr Davies was this year’s secretary general and is currently undertaking his preregistration training at Guy’s and St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust, London.

Charlotte Mawson, from University of Bradford, was elected vice-president.

Schools should do more to promote student exchanges

Schools of pharmacy should promote and facilitate the uptake of international exchanges for its students. This motion was proposed by Shahzil Mohamed, a second-year student at Liverpool John Moores University. International exchanges are a great opportunity to meet new people and learn about new cultures, he said.

Some conference participants talked about international opportunities they had experienced, such as a scheme run by the University of Bath to offer students a three month placement abroad (eg, in the US or Australia). However others, particularly students from the newer pharmacy schools, suggested that they had struggled to access information about such schemes.

The motion was carried, although some students believed that the onus for applying for exchange programmes should remain with individual students.

Pharmacy student of the year award

Elizabeth Aubrey, a third-year student at University of Manchester, was presented with the Reckitt Benckiser pharmacy student of the year award.

She wins a trip to this year’s International Pharmaceutical Students’ Federation congress in Romania.

Computerised dental prescriptions needed to improve patient safety

Dentists should move towards issuing computerised prescriptions. This was a motion proposed by Richard Goodwin, a third-year student at the University of Bradford. A good reason for the proposal was that such a move would make prescriptions easier to read and, therefore, improving patient safety, Mr Goodwin said.

It was also suggested that this would eradicate occasions when the dentist prescribes something that is not in the dental practitioners’ formulary.

The cost-effectiveness of the move was questioned, because the number of prescriptions issued by dentists is small compared with that of other prescribers. However, other participants suggested that the cost of a computer was minimal compared with the cost of other machinery purchased by dentists.

The motion was carried.