E-DRUG: Post-graduate education for pharmacists
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Hi E-Druggers,
I have received a request for advice from a senior pharmacist working in the government in a Pacific island. I have also received a similar request previously from a pharmacist in a Caribbean Island. So I thought I would do a generic reply and invite other E-Druggers who have participated in such courses to comment or others who offer such courses to contribute to a discussion.
The query I received said that the individual was interested in Distance Learning education but did not make clear whether he/she was interested in Continuing Education or Masters level education so I will discuss both starting with Continuing Education. I have had the pleasure of being involved in starting some of the courses described below so I am biased though I am only involved in two (BU and UWC) at the moment.
Starting with Continuing Education. The first and cheapest option is the WHO Technical Briefing seminar. This is offered in both French and English in June and October. This provides a broad overview of Access, Quality and Safety of Medicines. It is held in Geneva, is free and exposes participants to the range of WHO experts. The other participants are pretty interesting as well. The seminar is usually oversubscribed so it is good to apply with support from the WHO country office or the regional adviser. Sometimes WHO sponsors people to attend.
For more details see
http://www.who.int/medicines/technical_briefing/en/
The next option are the three short courses offered in July at the University of Utrecht.
These are the courses on Pharmaco-epidemiology, Pharmaceutical Policy Analysis and Pharmaco -economics. They are offered back to back so you can take two or even three together. They do offer a discount for the two or three and you would also save on travel costs by combining.
One neat feature of the Pharmaceutical Policy Analysis course is that during the course they have an open session where they invite different pharmaceutical policy makers from the Netherlands to participate in an afternoon session on a controversial topic. This is followed by a reception (drinks!) and a dinner. At the dinner the policy makers and implementers move tables after each course so that they can talk to as many of the course participants as they can. Can be very interesting!
Prof Aukje Mantel-Teeuwisse wrote an E-Drug message about these courses on March 16th. Her contact details are
Mantel-Teeuwisse, A.K.Mantel@uu.nl <A.K.Mantel@uu.nl>
Another option primarily for participants from Africa are the short courses offered at the University of Western Cape in South Africa in June and early July each year.
The first one week course is on Rational Medicine Use (RMU) and the second is on Supply Chain Management (SCM). Again these courses are offered back to back so can be taken in sequence with some savings. The RMU course that I am involved in has evolved from the INRUD Promoting Rational Drug Use course though many new sessions have been developed including on AMR and Evidence Based Medicine and Pharmacoeconomics.
The second SCM course was developed with and is taught with staff from Management Sciences for Health. Both of these courses are also offered as 14 week Distance learning courses as both CE and MPH courses.
What I particularly like with these courses is that they have faculty both from Schools of Pharmacy and Public Health. Hazel Bradley posted an E-Drug message about these courses on E-Drug on March 7th.
Here is the URL for more information https://www.uwc.ac.za/Faculties/CHS/soph/News/Pages/SOPH-issues-2016-Winter-School-Brochure.aspx
The Institute of Health Management Research, Jaipur at IIHMR University, offers short courses on rational drug use as one of a number of courses they offer each year. There was an E-Drug Message about the course on Patient Medicines Safety & Use of Medicine that was posted on February 15th 2016.
See https://www.iihmr.edu.in/trainings
There are many short courses on Supply Chain management and these are regularly advertised on E-Drug though how relevant these are to small island situations is unclear to me. I would invite Andrew Brown who knows these countries and is involved in some of the logistics related courses to comment.
In another message, I will write about my take on Masters level courses.
I look forward to comments and any discussion about this posting.
Richard Laing
Professor International Health
Boston University School of Public Health,
801 Massachusetts Avenue Boston MA 02118
Tel 617 414 1445 (Office) 617 435 7860 (Mobile)
E mail richardl@bu.edu