Continuing education vital for pharmacists

President of the Barbados Pharmaceutical Society (BPS), Derek Catlyn, is calling for mandatory continuing education for pharmacists to be put on the statute books, to ensure that high standards are maintained in that profession.

“My vision as the President of the Barbados Pharmaceutical Society is for pharmacists to embrace the concept of continuing education and career-development. The former has been mentioned continuously, but I look forward to when it
becomes law; that for pharmacists to register on an annual basis, you have to complete a required number of credits within the continuing education module which is a requirement already for doctors,” he said.

Catlyn made the comments yesterday morning during a service at the Calvary Moravian Church, where members of the BPS gathered to mark the start of Pharmacy Week 2017, being held this year under the theme “Bridging the Gap – Pharmacists’ Past, Present and Future, Ensuring Excellence”.

He explained that to improve the health status of this country, the right skill sets must exist in the health care team, at the clinical and community levels in both the private and public sectors, and he explained that includes pharmacists. To that end, the BPS President contended that continuing education is vital, especially if they are to be a key player in helping to address the myriad health challenges facing this island’s population on account of the rising incidence of chronic non communicable diseases (CNCDs) and other health conditions. He made the point while noting that CNCDs such as hypertension and diabetes are negatively impacting the society and are in fact responsible, directly and indirectly, for 80 per cent of all deaths within the country.

Following the service, Catlyn told The Barbados Advocate that he hopes that mandatory continuing pharmacy education becomes a reality sooner rather than later. He said reports coming from representatives of the Pharmacy Council are that the “all the information is there” to allow such a mandate to be made, it only needs now to be sanctioned by the powers that be.

“It is always important to re-educate yourself and there are always new drug therapies coming on the market and we need to keep abreast. If we think also about the technology that’s available, the average patient now knows more; things they’ve learned from the Internet, so we can’t just scratch the surface, our training has to be up-to-date and in-depth. We have to be able to help educate, encourage and empower patients because the main goal is to improve the quality of life of the Barbadian public; because as the saying goes, the healthier the nation is – the more productive it will be,” he said. (JRT)