Need for a change in Community Pharmacy system in India

A pharmacy is the place where most pharmacists practice the profession of pharmacy. Pharmacists in the community practice (setting) are community pharmacists.
Despite the huge IT boom and radical advances in the pharmacy field in the past 2 decades in India and worldwide, the sad fact remains that community pharmacy is still only at a nascent stage in India.
Years, almost decades ago, compounding and dispensing of medicines was a pharmacist’s primary job. A community pharmacy was a crude equivalent of an apothecary where the pharmacist’s duty not only included collection, storage and distribution of raw materials, but also proper dispensing with the required directions for usage. With the advent of modern technology and ready-to-use medicines, all of these responsibilities have lessened tremendously and now, the presence of a pharmacist in a community pharmacy is only to meet legal requirements. They provide only dispensing services within pharmacies. They merely count and pack tablets and capsules, and distribute these to consumers as if the pharmacies were fast food outlets. The worst part: these “services” are sometimes provided by substitutes who barely have any training at all.
All of this has been attributed by many to the increasing overenthusiastic marketing practices. Most of the distributors entice pharmacists and doctors with quick money making schemes, thus robbing of their ethics and moral responsibilities. Pharmacists are among the highest paid professionals in developed countries such as the USA and UK because in these countries, a pharmacist’s job entails responsibilities such as providing advice to customers about minor ailments, providing directions for usage – guiding the customers on very important issues such as self medication, over the counter medication, drug abuse, dose regimen etc., informing them regularly of vaccinations or any other such immunization programs, about proper storage of drugs etc. Implementation of the same in India is very obviously, the need of the hour.
A community pharmacist’s role can then be summarised thus: providing patient advice, correction of prescription errors, maintenance of patient medication records, coordination with the other allied professions like nursing and doctors in the matters concerning medicine.
With the help of state and national governments, it is possible to improve the current state of events. Simple provisions such as providing internet access in pharmacies for quick and easy reference of drugs and their related information online, making regular refresher courses in customer counselling mandatory for pharmacists and so on can prove to be vital steps towards achieving success.
The role of community pharmacy is to act in an important and responsible manner for the propagation of national health programmes. Many of our health programmes need intervention of all healthcare professionals from all areas for their successful implementation. The way Indian community pharmacists motivate in safeguarding that the modern medicines consumed have the intended effect will help them attain an appreciable position in the health care system of our country.