PHARMA LITERATI

The Pharmacy Council of India (PCI) should have conducted a feasibility study, situation assessment and gap analysis prior to the introduction of Pharm D course in the country. For a mega programme like Pharm D, healthcare providers and the Medical Council of India should also have been consulted on the viability of this course and whether the role of a clinical pharmacist would be relevant in a hospital environment, opined PS Bhagavan, former deputy director, Karnataka Health and Family Welfare Department.   Doctors are not recognising the role of a pharmacist in healthcare practice even as the job of a clinical pharmacist is to ascertain whether the prescribed medications are meeting the patients health needs, he added. When a dedicated six-year course was devised to fit into the healthcare system, it was necessary to stimulate the demand for the course to ensure supply of Pharm D professionals, Bhagavan told Pharmabiz.   The intent to create a pool of clini...

The students, who joined Pharm D course with dreams of bright future, are struggling for a job after graduating from colleges. The government, which created much hype when it started the course, washed its hands off now. Unable to bear the burden of fees reimbursement, the government wants to drop Pharm D course for three years, in the name of studying its usefulness and scope.  In 1998, the US Government announced that starting 2003, only those with minimum qualification of Doctor of Pharmacy (Pharm D) could practice pharmacy in USA. The major countries followed the USA and India also introduced Pharm D from 2008.  In western countries, the hospitals appointed Drug Therapeutics Committees to formulate drugs for all diseases and ailments. The committees include doctors, clinical pharmacists and nurses to chart out the standard prescription for every disease they treat in the hospital and how to administer the drugs. But the central government in India, which has...

We present here a guest post by Dr. Ankit Gaur, Clinical Pharmacist intern at Jaypee Hospital, New Delhi.  Disclaimer: The article is reproduced from the source with the permission of the author and the entire copyright are vested with the author and the publisher. It is published on this blog, just for the information of the readers and Pharma Literati does not hold any right over this.  Article: Suppose you study for six-seven years of your life, spend a fortune and face lots of hardship in finishing a course. After its completion, you try to get a government job as a professional who has the right qualification, but you can’t because the job you want does not exist. All your effort goes to waste. This is what’s happening to students who have done the Pharm. D (Doctor of Pharmacy) course. This course was introduced in 2008 by Pharmacy Council of India (PCI). It is a Pre-PhD post-graduate doctoral programme similar to Doctor of Medicine (MD)...

For Hari Krishna, Pharm D seemed to be the best bet for a great career! Reports from education columns and half-baked pieces of advice from acquaintances further cemented his desire to pursue the six-year course. However, ending seemed unfortunate and unpredictable as he along with several other graduates have been facing unemployment for the past several years. After fighting for justice for the last three years, they came to the streets and began relay fast for the last four days.  “ What sin we have committed ”, they are asking the government. With government’s approval only, the Doctor of Pharmacy course was started in 2008 with much hype. Till now, the government did not create a cadre to them, though they fall under Clinical Pharmacist cadre.  The graduates said, 3,000 students have passed out from the colleges after completing the course in the state. Now, the state is having 21,000 Pharm D candidates consisting of both pursuing their education and those ...