Pharmacy - A truly satisfying and progressive profession

Pharmacy has become a a truly satisfying and progressive profession. In recent times, a career that has gained the spotlight due to pandemic is pharmacy. Demand for quality pharmacists is growing in India and abroad. The pharmacist who formally practices pharmacy, is a healthcare expert on all aspects of medicines.

A career or occupation is the most important aspect of a person’s life as the occupation determines the destiny of a person. A career not only takes a significant portion of a person’s lifetime, it is also his or her roadway of progress. There are several professions and umpteen choices can be made. A person can get into stock market advisory and trade, or in other finance management roles, career seekers can become self – employed, there are golden career opportunities in marketing, and so on. In recent times, a career that has gained the spotlight due to pandemic is pharmacy, which is a truly satisfying and progressive profession.

What is pharmacy?

The profession of pharmacy is defined as the art and science of discovery, inventing, formulating, manufacturing, marketing, reuglating and professionally recommending the right use of medicines. Today, under the umbrella of pharmacy, additionally, medical devices and nutritional supplements are included. A pharmacist is the medicines expert – medicines for human and veterinary use. The person who formally pursues pharmacy as a career is called a pharmacist. Formal qualifications available in pharmacy include: Diploma in Pharmacy (D Pharm), Bachelor of Pharmacy (B Pharm), Pharm D (Doctor of Pharmacy), M Pharm (Master of Pharmacy) and PhD in Pharmacy or Pharmaceutical Sciences. In short, the pharmacist who formally practices pharmacy, is a healthcare expert on all aspects of medicines, and additionally – medical devices and nutritional supplements.

Attractions of pharmacy as a profession

Pharmacists not only have a satisfying career through their professional services – there is good opportunity to earn and lead an international life. The Indian pharmaceutical industry is globally integrated – India as a country is the largest producer of generic drugs in the world (generic drugs are off-patent medicines). Indian pharmaceutical industry is popular as the “pharmacy of the world” as India produces affordable medicines. India meets 50% of the global demand for vaccines and one in three children who are vaccinated by WHO is with an India made vaccine.

Indian pharmaceutical industry is a net exporter of generic (off-patent) medicines, meeting 40% of generic medicine demand in USA and 25% of generic medicine demand in UK. As per Iqvia market agency report, the total Indian pharmaceutical retail, hospital and ‘dispensing doctor’ market is Rs. 1,81,634 crores per annum (Dec 2021 figures) with about 14.00% annual growth (AIOCD AWACS market agency report). Additionally, India exports about Rs. 1,71,000 crores worth of pharmaceuticals. India ranks third in terms of volume of pharmaceutical production and 14^th in terms of value of pharmaceutical production, India produces affordable medicines.

India produces over 80% of the world’s anti-HIV medicines. Indian pharmaceutical sector contributes about 2% of India’s GDP and about 8% of total merchandise exports from India. The world’s largest producer of vaccines is Pune based Serum Institute of India. The pharmaceutical ecosystem of India is now climbing up the value chain by making drug discoveries and novel drug delivery formulations. For example saraglitazar is a novel drug invented in India by Zydus Cadila.

The Govt. is encouraging growth of medical devices sector and AYUSH systems of medicine. Thereby, an additional growth avenue for pharmacists is opening up in these areas. The retail pharmacy sector is a major source of livelihood for pharmacists, particularly D Pharm pharmacists. They work in stand-alone proprietary pharmacies, omnichannel and chain pharmacies. There are 8 lakh plus pharmacies in India and about 60000 wholesale pharmacy firms. The other pharmacy jobs are in R and D, production, quality, regulatory, drug control department, marketing, and teaching – besides the omnipresent retailing.

Professional and dignified

The pharmacy profession provides an aspirant a dignified knowledge profession where the person can work directly or indirectly work for patient welfare as a healthcare practitioner. After getting qualified as a pharmacist, he or she becomes an eternal learner as the pharmacist has to keep updated with technical developments. New drugs and therapies are constantly being brought to the market, and the pharmacist has to keep himself or herself abreast with these developments. The pharmacist in marketing, manufacturing, regulatory and researching is a part of the process that creates new therapies and medicine innovations.

Endnote:

Pharmacists’ help people heal. Pharmacist advice keeps patients on the right track; pharmacists serve patients at community and in hospitals. There is a wide variety of jobs available in pharmaceutical sector. Demand for quality pharmacists is growing in India and abroad. The increasing aging population across the world is driving the growth of pharmacy profession. Pharmacy is a knowledge profession and is seeing a rapid growth – thereby providing a dignified status to pharmacists globally.