Abstract
Pharmacists' roles are evolving from that of compounders and dispensers of medicines to that of experts on medicines within multidisciplinary health care teams. In the developing country context, the pharmacy is often the most accessible or even the sole point of access to health care advice and services.Because of their knowledge of medicines and clinical therapeutics, pharmacists are suitably placed for task shifting in health care and could be further trained to undertake functions such as clinical management and laboratory diagnostics. Indeed, pharmacists have been shown to be willing, competent, and cost-effective providers of what the professional literature calls "pharmaceutical care interventions"; however, internationally, there is an underuse of pharmacists for patient care and public health efforts. A coordinated and multifaceted effort to advance workforce planning, training and education is needed in order to prepare an adequate number of well-trained pharmacists for such roles.Acknowledging that health care needs can vary across geography and culture, an international group of key stakeholders in pharmacy education and global health has reached unanimous agreement that pharmacy education must be quality-driven and directed towards societal health care needs, the services required to meet those needs, the competences necessary to provide these services and the education needed to ensure those competences. Using that framework, this commentary describes the Pharmacy Education Taskforce of the World Health Organization, United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization and the International Pharmaceutical Federation Global Pharmacy and the Education Action Plan 2008–2010, including the foundation, domains, objectives and outcome measures, and includes several examples of current activities within this scope.
Highlights
Access to essential medicines is one of the most basic health services
To ensure access to and appropriate use of medicines, there is a need for an appropriately-trained pharmacy workforce
The scaling up and quality improvement of pharmacy education and training are essential for addressing workforce shortages and for meeting basic health needs
Summary
Access to essential medicines is one of the most basic health services. To ensure access to and appropriate use of medicines, there is a need for an appropriately-trained pharmacy workforce. An in-depth case study in one African country will investigate barriers and facilitators to capacity building in pharmacy education; define roles and responsibilities of pharmacists in enhancing health in African countries; and attempt to synthesize innovative strategies to recruiting and developing the academic workforce We will examine all the issues with a wide variety of stakeholders at ministry, university and practice levels with a view to using this qualitative data to produce a survey instrument to use with a number of other countries. The UNITWIN Network will establish a resource base and collaborative forum for exchange, research and capacity building dedicated to tackling challenges of academic capacity, quality assurance of educational systems and workforce competence This is the first time that a formal global network has been established for pharmacy education under the stewardship of the professional body and United Nations agencies. The Taskforce CoP currently connects more than 200 people from 56 different countries
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