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2/14/2012
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Pharmacy can rise to the challenge, profession told at Sigma conference in Thailand
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Dr Keith Ridge told the Sigma conference in Thailand via video link that it has a key role to play.
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Pharmacy can rise to the challenges demanded of it by a modern, restructured NHS, Bharat Shah, the managing director of Sigma Pharmaceuticals, told his company’s fourth annual conference in Thailand.
In front of a packed 370-strong audience of pharmacists, drug company executives and pharmacy politicians, Shah expressed his belief that pharmacists can continue their traditional role as dispensers of medicine and evolve into active healthcare clinicians capable of providing a holistic health service fit for the 21st century.
“The theme of the conference is the changing evolution of the pharmacy business. It is evolution of the pharmacy business, from its original form, which has been going on for 600 years almost, into the current pharmacy model which is offering not only the local dispensing service but diagnostic services, vaccination services, mobility, veterinary advice and, hopefully, pharmacy will become the first port of call for our customers,” he said.
“Pharmacists have to be winners. Winners don’t do different things but they do things differently. I’ve always maintained that this sector has a relationship with Darwin’s theory that this is the survival of the fittest. This is how it will be.”
The week-long conference, currently being held at the Hilton Hotel in Phuket, has attracted a variety of delegates and Shah was proud to address them in his opening speech. “Of course we have numerous pharmacy politicians but in this room, there may be less people, but between the people here, we’ve got roughly 2,000 independent pharmacy businesses, 3,000 pharmacy shops who will be interested, obviously the biggest one being Boots,” he said.
“And we’ve got almost the entire generic industry present in this room; the generic industry in the UK. We have almost £1 billion of business (in this room).”
The Prime Minister, David Cameron, sent a letter to the Sigma Conference, which was shown to delegates, telling them that pharmacy has an integral role to play in the NHS. “Community pharmacy has an important and expanding role in public health which is essential if we are to be ready for the challenges ahead,” he wrote.
Those sentiments were echoed by the shadow health secretary Andy Burnham, who also wrote a letter addressing the Sigma conference. “I recognise the essential role pharmacies and the pharmaceutical industry plays in delivering our healthcare system, through promoting better medicines use, improving access to care and delivering public health services,” he wrote.
Dr Keith Ridge, the chief pharmaceutical officer at the Department of Health, opened the conference via video link and insisted that pharmacy has a key role to play in the NHS. Other notable speakers included the MP Kevin Barron, chairman of the All-Party Parliamentary Pharmacy Group, Claire Ward, the former MP for Watford and chief executive of the Independent Pharmacy Federation and Dr James Kingsland, the national clinical lead for the NHS Clinical Commissioning Community.
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