LAHORE: Only one pharmacist is available for over 1,200 beds in the most hospitals in the country while the World Health Organization (WHO)’s set standard is one pharmacist for 50 beds to provide upto the mark healthcare.
This was informed by renowned Pharmacist and leader of Pakistan Pharmacists Forum (PPF) Noor Mehar Advocate while talking to APP on Wednesday.
Regarding role of a pharmacist in a healthcare establishment, he said a pharmacist prescribes quantity and quality of medicines for a patient.
Pharmacy services meant provision of services of selection, counseling, dispensing, prescription, monitoring, drug utilization etc by a pharmacist, he added.
Talking about different courses of Pharmacy, he said that pharmacy had two disciplines, one was called B-Pharmacy of four years course while the other was known as Master of Pharmacy of five years course.
To a question about the number of institutions of pharmacy working in the country, he said that around 45 institutions including public and private sectors were working in the country from which 28 were situated in Punjab and these institutes were producing around 2,700 pharmacists every year.
He said that over 15,000 pharmacists were in need of employment from which 10,000 were only in Punjab, While posts of pharmacist were vacant in the most hospitals, adding that only 88 posts of pharmacists in Lahore General Hospital and 25 posts in Punjab Institute of Cardiology (PIC) were yet to be filled.
To another question, he said a license from the Central Pharmacy Council in Islamabad was required to run an institution but unfortunately mostly private institutions of pharmacy were working without a licence and received Rs 125,000 fee for a six-month semester while public sector institutions received Rs 40,000 per year.
He said a good pharmacist should be aware of new international research about medicines and treatment.
