A pharmacist is a healthcare professional who specializes in the preparation, dispensing, and management of medications and who provides pharmaceutical advice and guidance. Pharmacists often serve as primary care providers in the community, and may offer other services such as health screenings and immunizations.
Pharmacy is the science and practice of discovering, producing, preparing, dispensing, reviewing and monitoring medications, aiming to ensure the safe, effective, and affordable use of medicines. It is a miscellaneous science as it links health sciences with pharmaceutical sciences and natural sciences. The professional practice is becoming more clinically oriented as most of the drugs are now manufactured by pharmaceutical industries. Based on the setting, pharmacy practice is either classified as community or institutional pharmacy. Providing direct patient care in the community of institutional pharmacies is considered clinical pharmacy.
A Doctor of Pharmacy is a professional doctorate in pharmacy. In some countries, it is a doctoral degree to practice the profession of pharmacy or to become a clinical pharmacist. In many countries, people with their Doctor of Pharmacy are allowed to practice independently and can prescribe drugs directly to patients. A PharmD program has significant experiential and/or clinical education components in introductory and advanced levels for the safe and effective use of drugs. Experiential education prepares graduates to be practice-ready, as they already have spent a significant amount of time training in areas of direct patient care and research.
The Royal Pharmaceutical Society is the body responsible for the leadership and support of the pharmacy profession (pharmacists) within England, Scotland, and Wales. It was created along with the General Pharmaceutical Council (GPhC) in September 2010 when the previous Royal Pharmaceutical Society of Great Britain was split so that representative and regulatory functions of the pharmacy profession could be separated. Membership in the society is not a prerequisite for engaging in practice as a pharmacist within the United Kingdom. Its predecessor the Pharmaceutical Society of Great Britain was founded on 15 April 1841.
The Pharmaceutical Society of Australia (PSA) is a professional organisation of Australian pharmacists. PSA is the peak national body for pharmacists, representing all of the pharmacy profession in Australia, with approximately 18,000 members. PSA is the major provider of continuing professional development programmes for pharmacists in Australia. PSA also organises various pharmacy events including a national conference attended by over 1,200 delegates from around Australia and internationally. PSA publishes the Australian Pharmaceutical Formulary, the Australian Pharmacist journal, and various other pharmacy publications.
The International Pharmaceutical Federation or Fédération Internationale Pharmaceutique, abbreviated as FIP, is a non-governmental organization (NGO) with official relations with the World Health Organization. It is the global body representing over four million pharmacists, pharmaceutical scientists and pharmaceutical educators through 153 national organisations, academic institutional members and individual members.
Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST), commonly known as UST, Tech or Kwame Tech, is a public university located in Kumasi, Ghana. The university focuses on science and technology. It is the first public university established in the country, as well as the largest university in the Ashanti Region of Ghana.
The American Pharmacists Association, founded in 1852, is the first-established professional society of pharmacists in the United States. The association consists of more than 62,000 practicing pharmacists, pharmaceutical scientists, student pharmacists, pharmacy technicians, and others interested in the profession. Nearly all U.S. pharmacy specialty organizations were originally a section or part of this association.
R. Tim Webster, SCD was a founder and long-time executive director of the American Society of Consultant Pharmacists (ASCP). He was born October 9, 1946, in Martins Ferry, Ohio and lived in St. Clairsville, Ohio until he graduated from high school. He received his degree in pharmacy from Ohio State University (OSU) in 1969 and then dedicated his entire career to promoting quality pharmaceutical care to the elderly. Prior to his 27-year tenure as executive director of the ASCP, he was involved in regulatory affairs relating to long-term care in both the public and private sector. He died of cancer on July 6, 2003.
The International Pharmaceutical Students' Federation (IPSF) is a non-governmental, non-political and non-religious organisation that represents pharmaceutical students, pharmacy students and recent graduates from all over the world. It was founded in 1949 and it is the oldest faculty-based student organisation. IPSF represents over 500,000 individuals in more than 100 countries with 127 different representative pharmacy student member organisations.
David Ofori-Adjei is a Ghanaian physician, medical researcher, academic and medical journal editor. His main areas of research are clinical pharmacology, pharmacogenetics, infectious diseases such as malaria, schistosomiasis, Buruli ulcer, and HIV/AIDS and public sector pharmaceutical management. He is currently the Editor-in-Chief of the Ghana Medical Journal.
Optometry is a relatively new field in eye care in Ghana.
The Australian Pharmaceutical Advisory Council (APAC), active between 1996 and 2006, was "a consultative forum that brought together stakeholders from the medical, nursing and pharmacy professions, as well as industry, consumers and government, to advise the Australian Government Minister for Health and Ageing on medicines policy". In 1996 APAC contributed to the Industry Commission inquiry into the pharmaceutical industry. Over subsequent years the Council developed Australia's National Medicines Policy (NMP), and published several guidelines on medication management. Secretariat support for APAC was provided by the Australian Government Department of Health and Ageing - National Medicines Policy Strategies Section.
The Pharmaceutical Association of Mauritius (PAM) is a professional society serving pharmacists in Mauritius. It was founded by a group of pharmacists in 1979.
The United Kingdom Clinical Pharmacy Association (UKCPA) is a non-profit organisation which actively develops clinical pharmacy practice in medicines management.
Ahmed Tijjani Mora (OON) is a Nigerian pharmacist, academic, former Registrar and now Chairman of the Governing Council of Pharmacists Council of Nigeria. He is the National President, Ahmadu Bello University Alumni Association. He was elected President of the Alumni Association in August 2015 at the Annual General Assembly (AGA) of the association. The assembly was attended by delegates from over 25 States. Prior to his election, he was the substantive Deputy National president of the association.
Zada Mary Cooper was an American pharmacist and educator.
The Joint Commission of Pharmacy Practitioners (JCPP) is the largest professional delegation representing the interests of pharmacists within the United States. JCPP represents 13 professional associations in the field of pharmacy, developing consensus policy directives for the profession. It is well known for the 2014 development of "The Pharmacists’ Patient Care Process," which provides broad, consensus guidelines for how clinical pharmacists should practice.
The Ghana Institute of Architects (GIA) is a professional society for architects and built environment affiliates located in Accra, Ghana. The first professional body in independent Ghana, it was registered in 1962 and inaugurated in December 1964 as a self-governing and fully indigenous institution to advance the architectural practice, education and accreditation in the country. The Institute is the successor to the pre-independence Gold Coast Society of Architects, a colonial social club for Gold Coast-based architects founded in August 1954. The first president of the Ghana Institute of Architects was Theodore Shealtiel Clerk (1909–1965), the first formally trained, professionally certified Ghanaian architect and an award-winning urban planner who designed, planned and developed the harbour city of Tema.
Alexander Nii Oto Dodoo, is a Ghanaian pharmacist and academic. He is a clinical pharmacologist and a professor at the Centre for Tropical Clinical Pharmacology, University of Ghana Medical School. He is also the director of the World Health Organization (WHO) Collaborating Centre for Advocacy and Training in Pharmacovigilance. He has been serving as the Director-General of Ghana Standards Authority since 2017.
