Latest opinion
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What you are saying about pharmacy degree apprenticeshipsSubscription
Your responses to our call for opinions on the plans to offer an alternative route into pharmacy.
Can hub-and-spoke transform medicines supply in the UK? The jury is still outSubscription
Community pharmacy’s flat funding settlement in England is linked to ‘efficiencies’ to be made through the hub-and-spoke model. With a consultation on the model on the cards for 2020, it is time to reconsider whether its benefits stack up.
Governments must make tackling AMR worth pharmacy's whileSubscription
Pharmaceutical companies won’t develop fast, cheap and effective diagnostic tools on their own — incentives are the missing piece to tackling antimicrobial resistance.
It's not just medicines that improve health — pharmacists need a better understanding of nutritionSubscription
Research shows that dietary changes can help to manage conditions such as diabetes and asthma, so undergraduate pharmacy courses must better prepare pharmacists to advise patients on healthy eating behaviours.
Taiwo Owatemi: 'Like every pharmacist in the country, I’ve been frustrated by medicines shortages'Subscription
How pharmacy led Taiwo Owatemi, Labour MP for Coventry North West, to her new role in politics.
Jamie Waterall: ‘Pharmacy is fundamental to achieving our ambitions’Subscription
As deputy chief nurse at Public Health England, Jamie Waterall is passionate about the opportunities for pharmacy in improving the nation’s health.
Toby Anderson: 'There will be fewer pharmacies in fewer locations'Subscription
Toby Anderson, chief executive of McKesson UK, on managing LloydsPharmacy’s parent company during a crucial period for healthcare provision and pharmacy.
Regan McCahill: 'The mental health of students is of the utmost importance'Subscription
Regan McCahill, president of the British Pharmaceutical Students’ Association, explains how her organisation will support newly qualified pharmacists in 2020.
A rethink of our approach to chronic pain is desperately neededSubscription
Chronic pain places a huge burden on millions of individuals, families and carers in Great Britain. However, despite being such a prevalent condition, the tools for managing it are pretty blunt.
Medicines use in children and young people: it is time for a reappraisalSubscription
The Pharmaceutical Journal is announcing an initiative to share new information on how medicines can be used safely and effectively in children and young people.
Community pharmacy referral scheme is not a new conceptSubscription
The community pharmacist consultation service has been lauded since it was announced in July 2019, but it is similar to schemes that have been tried in recent years.
A year of change for pharmacySubscription
The profession is likely to undergo significant changes over the forthcoming year.
Why we must urgently rethink prescribing short-acting bronchodilators for asthmaSubscription
Guidelines from the Global Initiative for Asthma present a radical overhaul of the way we manage asthma; but our current approach isn’t working, and nothing will change if it is not challenged.
It's time for comprehensive polypharmacy reviews for older people with cancerSubscription
The number of older people with cancer is growing and so is their risk of harmful polypharmacy — care for this expanding group of patients must improve.
We should not write off vitamin D supplementation — especially in pregnancySubscription
Testing all pregnant women for insufficient vitamin D levels is expensive, but two systematic reviews suggest that providing them all with vitamin D supplements could reduce risk of pre-eclampsia, gestational diabetes and low birth weight.
We must follow these five rules to avert an antimicrobial resistance crisisSubscription
Simply reducing the use of antibiotics, while discovering new ones, is not enough to keep resistance at bay — healthcare professionals need to understand bacteria’s evolutionary biology if they are to subvert it.
How ditching professional tribalism and working collaboratively benefits us all
We shouldn’t be afraid to collaborate with non-pharmacists — we all become better professionals when we teach and learn from each other.
Pharmacy closures: the funding cuts landed me in A&E
A pharmacist’s experience of deciding to close their pharmacy reveals the personal toll of the government’s cuts to funding for the sector.
Why storytelling is essential to my work as a mental health pharmacist
Stories bring us closer together, help us build trust and deliver wisdom, hope and healing — never underestimate their power, says mental health pharmacist Nana Tomova.
How my part-time medicines safety PhD changed prescribing practice for older people
Pharmacist Su Wood’s work on estimating reduced kidney function led to a major change in national recommendations for prescribing in older people.
Stressed, self-checking pharmacists must be bold and temporarily close their pharmaciesSubscription
In November 2019, The Pharmaceutical Journal wrote that “almost half of community pharmacists admit to self-checking their own dispensing” (Pharm J 2019;303[7931]:294). This dismayed me.
A handheld treatment record for patients receiving chemotherapySubscription
Pharmacists recognise how important it is to ensure an accurate and current medication history for patients before commencing therapies or making recommendations on how to manage conditions. This is arguably even more important for people with cancer who are undergoing systemic anticancer therapy (SACT) — a group for whom this already challenging as access to specialist medical records is often limited, and the patient’s medicine can frequently change. In addition, the narrow therapeutic ...
I do not want to lose my community pharmacist to the central dispensing modelSubscription
It is an uncertain time in pharmacy, although it has not always been this way. However, to an outsider, some pharmacists seem to be precipitating their own demise.
Pharmacist-led service for improving cardiometabolic risk and metabolic syndrome for people with severe mental illnessSubscription
Individuals with severe mental illness (SMI), such as schizophrenia and bipolar affective disorder, have a higher risk of physical illness than those without SMI[1]. These physical illnesses exist within the general population, but the incidence and impact on morbidity and mortality in those with SMI is significantly ...
Original Victorian pharmacy recreated in full at the Science MuseumSubscription
One of London’s flagship museums invites visitors to Gibson and Son’s, a Victorian chemist’s shop preserved in time.
Useful look at the wider societal effects of the contraceptive pillSubscription
How the Pill Changes Everything: Your Brain on Birth Control by Sarah Hill
Gripping account of the human cost of the United States' opioid crisisSubscription
BBC Three. Addicted: America’s Opioid Crisis
A heated look at vaccine oppositionSubscription
BBC. Conspiracy Files: Vaccine Wars. Current Affairs Television: London; 2019
Peter Hylands (1946–2019) Subscription
As the first pharmaceutical scientist member of the Royal Pharmaceutical Society, Peter Hylands’ respected and varied career specialised in natural products research.
Stewart Adams (1923–2019)Subscription
Having fallen into the pharmacy profession “purely by chance”, Stewart Adams OBE went on to discover ibuprofen, one of the world’s best selling anti-inflammatory painkillers.
‘Pioneer of pharmacy’: Graham Calder (1933–2018) Subscription
Described as a ‘pioneer of pharmacy’, former chief pharmacist of Scotland Graham Calder has been an inspiration for many pharmacy professionals during, and since, his varied career.
William Charles Evans (1924–2018) Subscription
Author of Trease and Evans’ Pharmacognosy, a seminal text on the chemistry and uses of medicinal plants, William Charles Evans was a prolific researcher and educator throughout his 60-year career.
