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Welcome to the first homepage edition of i2P for 2012.
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We apologise to all those potential subscribers who were unable to register with us in the second half of 2011, but if you try once more you should have no problem.

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Volume 2012 Number 1

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Suddenly the PGA discovers "Pharmacists"

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	Neil Johnston articles by this author...
Introducing current ideas, perspectives and issues, to the profession of pharmacy

A media release published this week indicates that there will be an oversupply of pharmacists of around 2009 in surplus within five years.
The release was based on a recent survey of which the author details appear in the news report below.
The last survey into the Pharmacy Workforce circa 2003 indicated there would be a shortage of pharmacists.
i2P reported on that survey and commented:
” The long awaited workforce report from the Third Agreement has arrived and the news is gloomy for those wanting an early retirement or thinking about cutting their hours back. By 2010 we'll be 3000 pharmacists short of meeting demand and as far as ever from filling the gaps.
I strongly recommend any pharmacists who intend to be practicing anytime in the next 10 years read though this report (A Study of the Demand and Supply of Pharmacists, 2000 - 2010). “
Goto link:
http://www.computachem.com.au/i2P/emag/Issue13/Article8.shtml
Well, we are progressing into 2010 and the projected shortfall of pharmacists did not happen.
Why then should we believe the current projection?
To develop some thoughts on this issue we have asked Mark Coleman to comment on the Pharmacy  News report published on the 24^th March 2010 which follows:

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“A projected oversupply of pharmacists and the prospect of graduates not having enough work after leaving university has been hailed by the Pharmacy Guild of Australia as evidence that the profession could take on new roles within the health care system. A work force model developed by Human Capital Alliance predicted that there could be a surplus of 2,009 pharmacists in Australia within five years, rising to 2,594 by 2020 and 3,582 by 2025. According to Guild president Kos Sclavos, however, the surplus indicates to the Federal Government that there is capacity for pharmacy to increase its scope of practice. “Our case is to show the Government that pharmacy is well placed to take on new programs because we have capacity and that is something that no other profession has,” Mr Sclavos told Pharmacy eNews. “There is going to be something in the [Fifth Community Pharmacy] Agreement which I can’t yet announce which will present a huge opportunity for pharmacy in expanding their scope.” Despite admitting that new pharmacists could find themselves without enough work because of the surplus, Mr Sclavos stopped short of calling for pharmacy schools to produce less graduates because that could dent the perception of the pharmacy profession. “If we reach an unemployment rate, there is a very quick domino effect with school counsellors saying ‘don’t do pharmacy as a career’ and rather than pharmacy being an elite program at universities it will become an also ran,” he said. “So that’s where this domino effect will occur where schools will go down, people won’t want to do pharmacy and the universities don’t fill their quotas.” Mr Sclavos maintained that the way to deal with the extra capacity was to expand pharmacy services. “I am very confident that once the preventive health agency is established then it will at least be one opportunity,” he said. “But you have to work with the government of the day and that’s what the Guild has always done. The main thing from our point of view is that pharmacy is well placed to take on new roles because we have enough pharmacists.”

Mark Coleman:

Reading the media release and the i2P article dated March 2003 my first comment was how inaccurate the first PGA projection was – and it begs the question, how much faith can we put in the current version?
Of course one sector of pharmacy, that of pharmacy schools, rose to the challenge post 2003 and began training and graduating more pharmacists and opening new schools.
But I know that it was not done without some planning.
Academia, soon after they began to do their bit, tried to negotiate with the Pharmacy Guild of Australia (PGA) to develop clinical programs so they would have a “home” for their graduates and subsequent employment.
It was about this time that that the PGA began to firm up on their supply focused policy, and that did not sit well with academia.
And down the track after that, we had Charlie Benrimoj with his outburst, calling the PGA “gorillas”.
Now we suddenly have the PGA embracing the idea of additional professional services because “we have enough pharmacists”.
They (PGA) have changed from being gorillas to leopards – but leopards never change their spots.
I don’t think for one minute that the PGA will make an absolute success of this transition.
For one, it is not their province. The PSA should be driving this agenda from the bottom up.
The other is that they will stultify the profession by creating professional services that follow a monotonous sequence similar to dispensing – and we have had enough of that!

I can’t say that I am looking forward to the deep and dark secret held within the Fifth Community Pharmacy Agreement, because if there was something worthwhile there would have been public relations programs being introduced to increase any take up.
It's just a bit of mysterious "spin".

But the big question is why the PGA suddenly wish to organise programs for pharmacists?
Aren’t they stepping out of their long touted role of only representing pharmacy owners?

Of course, the PGA view of the world is that these pharmacists should always touch their forelock as employees and be thankful for their lot. They should also represent cheap labour because they are in surplus.
Kos Sclavos got one thing right when he said:

“If we reach an unemployment rate, there is a very quick domino effect with school counselors saying ‘don’t do pharmacy as a career’ and rather than pharmacy being an elite program at universities it will become an also ran,” he said. “So that’s where this domino effect will occur where schools will go down, people won’t want to do pharmacy and the universities don’t fill their quotas.”

Well Kos, that is simply the law of supply and demand. So any projected oversupply of pharmacists will very quickly become an undersupply and wages will go up.
Not what you want is it Kos?
But in the process, pharmacist practitioners lose all motivation because of lack of stimulus and independence. Community pharmacy is a sterile world clinically, but it need not and should not be in this state.

I also note that Kos Sclavos stopped short of calling on pharmacy schools to produce less graduates. I think they would simply tell him where to get off and concentrate on providing suitable infrastructure to nurture independent pharmacist practitioners.
In other words stop trying to dominate the world and just do a proper job in your own domain.

Meanwhile we should all pray that the resource-starved PSA can break through politically and receive sufficient independent funds to create the type of practice pharmacists that are needed – not the conveyor belt type service provider vision of the PGA.
The PGA is only in it for the money to maintain their executive lifestyle.
Fight them for it PSA and put it to good use.

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