Expanded role of pharmacists

0

Associate Professor Dr Yeong Siew Wei

 Pharmaceutical sciences is an expanding field and pharmacists do more than just dispensing medicine

KUCHING: Most people think the job of a pharmacist is only to dispense medicine.

The truth is pharmaceutical sciences is an expanding field and pharmacists now work not only in industry, healthcare and community but also sales and marketing as well as research and development.

So when somebody tells Associate Professor Dr Yeong Siew Wei, Dean of UCSI University’s Faculty of Pharmaceutical Sciences, there aren’t enough jobs for pharmacists, her response is a straight “I don’t think so.”

Like most fresh school leavers, Dr Yeong wasn’t sure what to do after SPM.

Although her first thought was to be a doctor, her father advised her to take a slightly different path.

“He told me if I wanted a family, then I would not want to go for medicine – un-less I was ready to sacrifice a lot of my time. Pharmaceutical sciences is more flexible in balancing work and personal life,” she recalled.

Dr Yeong graduated from the University of Kansas, USA, with a Bachelor of Science degree in pharmacy.

She worked half a year at a retail pharmacy in Wichita before getting a call from her school, offering a doctorate in the same programme.

She asked her father whether she should continue her education and he replied why not — unless she was in a hurry to do something else.

“So I followed his advice since all I wanted was become a pharmacist.”

Towards the end of 1996, Dr Yeong returned to Malaysia and worked at Subang Jaya Medical Center (SJMC) as a Provisionally Registered Pharmacist (PRP) for half a year.

She admitted that back then, a pharmacist’s role was limited to dispensing medicine over the counter and the separation between doctors and pharmacists was visible, making it harder for them to become a team when it came to treating patients.

Today, the doctor-pharmacist divide has narrowed. Pharmacists can now be part of a healthcare team comprising doctors, nurses, nutritionists and psychiatrists.

Dr Yeong said medicine was about looking at the patient and seeing what he or she was suffering from.

“It’s about diagnosing the patient whereas pharmacy is about management of his or her medication.

“So the part on diagnosing is left to the doctors who have all the expertise and equipment to find out what’s wrong with the patient.

“Once they have done that, they come out with the prescription and this is where pharmacists come in,” she explained.
In certain situations where a patient has to take multiple drugs or medications, pharmacists might have to step in to help doctors regulate the drug dosage to maximize the medicine’s efficacy and reduce the risk of toxicity.

“For pharmacists, especially when dealing with in-patients, it’s important to know the state of their kidney and liver functions as these two organs are important in eliminating the drugs from the body,” Dr Yeong said.

According to her, pharmacists have three main career options — to be a com-munity pharmacist, an industrial pharmacist or a hospital and clinical pharmacist.

It all boils to personal choice and preference.

On how she became involved with education, Dr Yeong said: “After a while, I thought I needed to make good use of my doctorate degree – that’s how I got into it.”

She decided to delve into the field of education by first joining what was then the International Medical College for two years before joining UCSI in 2000 which, at that time, was about to start a pharmacy programme. She has been with UCSI for 14 years now.

When meeting a fresh batch of students, Dr Yeong often tells them they are not only students but pharmacists in training.

Before being admitted into UCSI’s four-year Bachelor of Pharmacy programme, candidates are required to attend an interview to determine their eligibility.

“Most of them will say they join the programme because they love chemistry but I tell them pharmacy is more than just chemistry. So instead of being an interview-ing session, it becomes a bit like a counselling session,” she said.
Indeed, there is more to pharmacy than just chemistry. Compassion, determina-tion and commitment as well as the desire to help others are the qualities that shape a good pharmacist.

“We very seldom turn down students as we screen those with good results before the interview. We ask the students more on what their interests are and listen to their response,” Dr Yeong added.

While candidates have to have good results — whether it’s A-Level, STPM, matric-ulation, foundation in science or their first degree in science, they must also possess good communication skills — which is important when it comes to inter-acting with patients and explaining to them the effects of medication to be dispensed.

A pharmaceutical programme does get tougher at a higher level since it also deals with human lives. During the course, students are taught to see a patient as a whole person — not only the physical aspect but also those of the mental and emotional. Ultimately, acceptance into the programme hinges on the nature and personality of the candidate.

“The types of students we are looking for must know in their heart and soul they have the desire to help others,” Dr Yeong stressed.

Apart from having outstanding results, the pharmacist in training must be able to feel “sympathy and empathy” for the sick and have the drive to want to help lessen their pain.

According to Dr Yeong, when dealing with patients, the ability to visualise the problems from their perspective and understand their pain is crucial to becoming a competent pharmacist.

UCSI has produced 800 working pharmacists not only in Malaysia but also Singapore and Australia. It also has a total of 350 students in the parmaceutical programme.