Pharmacy Guild National President Trent Twomey has told this month’s inaugural ‘Pharmacy Careers Summit’ that the profession is emotionally rewarding because, “nothing is more satisfying than being there for Australians when they need you the most.”
Professor Twomey was invited to open the summit on July 7, in which he told budding young pharmacists of how things have changed since he first made the choice to become a community pharmacist.
“What we’re doing today is far more than what we were doing twenty years ago, and I know the next twenty years are going to be just as exciting,” he said.
Among the big changes he reflected on is the growth in the demand for pharmacists and their staff especially during COVID.
“The 26 million, nearly 27 million Australians that contribute 450 million individual patients visits to Australia’s 6,000 community pharmacies relied on their community pharmacy more than ever over the course of the pandemic.
“Australians could not get an appointment with their GP, so instead they asked their pharmacist.”
And he says pharmacists are doing more today and will do more in the future as the workforce moves to full scope of practice.
“Today in 2023 Australians can ask their pharmacist for more things than they have ever been able to before.”
He cites the example of pharmacists being able to prescribe treatment for women suffering painful urinary tract infections which he says saw them “suffer in silence” as they waited to get an appointment with their GP or desperately sought treatment in Australia’s overcrowded emergency wards.
“Now Australian women can simply ask their pharmacist for a treatment for this really painful but easily treatable condition.”
He congratulated those who have already made the choice to become a pharmacist in a career he says won’t let them down.
“Australia’s 6,000 community pharmacies now have really stepped up, they’ve changed, and they are continuing to change to be the backbone of Australia’s healthcare system.”
