If capping student numbers isn’t the answer, we need a new approach, says Noel Wicks

As someone who came out of university just prior to the fallow year, when the change in degree length meant no pharmacists qualified, I’ve not really known a period where demand for pharmacists hasn’t outstripped supply. That is until recently, of course, when growing numbers of schools of pharmacy and swelling student intakes are fast tipping the balance.

The recent announcement by the minister for universities, Greg Clark MP, that he had no intention of capping pharmacy student numbers, comes as little surprise. It’s not really the government’s style to step in over these sorts of issues and I suspect that they will leave Darwinian principles to sort it out over the coming years.

This survival of the fittest principle will affect not just individual pharmacists, but also academic institutions. It would seem almost inevitable that, as the ranks of the pharmacy profession grow, any subsequent unemployment would have a knock-on effect on the numbers of people seeking to become pharmacists. In these times, the prospect of a job at the end of a degree is usually a key course-choice driver.

If this were to be the case then it would seem logical that there would be an inevitable shrinking of class sizes or even the numbers of institutions offering pharmacy. Of course, none of this would happen overnight and in the mean time it leaves pharmacy and pharmacists with a bit of a conundrum regarding employment – or the lack thereof.

Or does it? I’m not convinced that the outlook is as bleak as some commentators would have us believe. When I first qualified, I can recall the expectations classmates had in terms of being highly sought after, to the point of almost ‘naming our price’ for locum or manager positions. While this was all helpful for paying off student loans, I don’t feel it was actually helpful for us as newly qualified pharmacists. What would have been far more conducive to a great start in this profession would have been a structured postgraduate programme that developed us as clinicians and also as managers.

These sorts of programmes are starting to spring up now, as the growing supply of recently qualified pharmacists look to secure work and gain invaluable experience. These pharmacists can provide a much-needed lifeline to busy community pharmacies by becoming economically viable second pharmacist cover, and perhaps are preferable to using checking technicians in some circumstances.

In that way, becoming a pharmacy manager would be a goal to work towards rather than something that is assumed alongside the passing of the pre-reg exam. Of course, this is broadly similar to what happens in the hospital sector. Pharmacists entering secondary care expect to spend their early years gaining experience and knowledge in the pursuit of furthering themselves up the career ladder.

So, is it time to build the community pharmacy ladder instead of the one-step footstool we have at the moment? Personally, I think that the answer to this is a resounding yes.

Noel Wicks is an independant pharmacist