E-drug: Training Clinical Pharmacy and Pharmaceutics
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[Home based treatment has been discussed quite extensively on e-drug.
For e-druggers interested to review previous discussions it is worth
looking at the archives. BS]
Thanks for the message you posted on afro-nets recently, concerning
home based management of fevers. This is a letter of comments from
my experience in Uganda. These are my comments, which may not
necessarily reflect the views of Makerere University, Kampala, Uganda
or the Pharmaceutical Society of Uganda or my local Ministry of
Health.
Home based management of fevers like many programmes is a v.good
short-term arrangement to handle childhood illness. Certainly mothers
get access to medicines from unqualified providers of essential drugs.
In the past, WHO (World Health Organisation) developed courses on
rational drug use and these were incorporated into the pharmacology
curricula for undergraduates in medical schools. There is also the
International Network on Rational Drug Use (INRUD) -- But positive
impact from these arrangements is yet to be realised. While in most
National Drug Policies there are components of training professionals
to handle drugs, pharmacists in the developing world continue to be
few and most Schools of Pharmacy lack facilitation.
Pharmacy in the developing world has not been facilitated; yet in
most poor settings, drugs represent the highest out of pocket house
hold expenditure!!!
If WHO, Geneva would like to see tangible and sustainable results in
the area of quality use of drugs in developing countries, this what
can do the trick
1. Empower Schools of Pharmacy in Developing Countries with
facilities so as to expand intake.
2. Ensure that lecturers of Clinical Pharmacy and Pharmaceutics in
these Schools of Pharmacy are awarded Scholarships for further study.
Studying these subjects at post graduate level should initially be
from a country with a developed system. Learned and knowldgeable
lecturers are more likely to churn competent graduates, who will
flood the market. The graduates will run drug distribution points
and advise mothers correctly -- as numbers increase.
Hope you will take these issues into consideration,
regards,
George Kibumba, B.Pharm, MPS
Teaching Assistant,
Dept Of Pharmacy, Mulago
Makerere University, Kampala, Uganda.
P.O.BOX 7062,
KAMPALA
Kibumba George <kibumba@yahoo.com>
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