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IPSF NEWSLETTER
Student Exchange Programme
Issue N90
St
International Pharmaceutical Students Federation
IP ud SF e N
Iss nt Ex EW ue ch an SL N9 ge E 0 Pr T T og E ra R m m e
Student Exchange Programme
Summary
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SEP in EGYPT
Hello all IPSFers, Welcome to the special 2nd edition of the SEP Newsletter!! In this edition, I am delighted to present to you SEP experiences from ALL regions of IPSF. This edition serves up a snapshot of South America, Middle East, Asia, Africa and Europe! This edition is sure to entice you to think outside of the box and stimulate you to challenge yourself to experience a new country completely! In addition to that, we have a special section about the Pharmaceutical Japan Tour. I hope this article will inspire new and upcoming associations to run something similar to entice more students to their country! I also hope that this will certainly BOOST Japans status in SEP for the next upcoming years! It is with great pleasure that I introduce the International Pharmaceutical Federation (FIP) Community Pharmacy Section (CPS) in this Newsletter. CPS has been an invaluable partner to IPSF and for SEP this past year, through their interest and assistance in spreading the word about SEP through their membership base. Enjoy!! Viva la pharmacie!
Regards,
SEP in TAIWAN
SEP in PORTUGAL
SEP in GHANA
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PARO
Pan American Regional Office
Learning
to u
harmacy
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EMRO
Eastern Mediterannean Regional Office
SEP in EGYPT
The First of August seemed to be a regular day just like any other, until I got to my rooms window and looked outside. Downtown Cairo was at my feet! A few meters away, the Egyptian Museum was standing imposingly while Tahrir square and the adjacent boulevards seemed so busy. Luckily, everything was so quiet up here! Most of us were already having breakfast in the small lobby of our hostel and the first day of our adventure was about to start. The idea came when a few months ago I received an email regarding Student Exchange Programme of IPSF. Egypt seemed to have the most interesting offer as their programme included training at the 3rd largest Childrens Cancer Hospital worldwide and and the first one in Africa. We had visits to the GlaxoSmithKline factory facilities as well as in the local Delta Pharma and to the largest pharmacy chain in Egypt, Al Ezzaby.
SEP in EGYPT
My application was approved and the trip began alongside 12 students from all over the world and accompanied by the most helpful and enthusiastic team from EPSF. The month passed so quickly, full of adventures, challenges and lots of fun among some of the nicest places in the country! 2 Croatian, 1 Canadian, 3 Polish, 2 Malaysian, 2 Spanish and finally 2 Greeks (including me) filled our hearts and cameras with the nicest memories of Aswan, Luxor, Alexandria, Hurgada, Mountain Sinai, cruise on the Nile, camping under the veil of the sky, swimming in the oasis springs, relaxing on Red Sea beaches and even playing hide and seek with white foxes in the White desert or dancing with the Bedouins. Of course, history lessons could not have been skipped.
Definitely, Egypt and its people will stay in my memory leaving me the best impressions. Their passion for Pharmacy made them achieve a great educational, professional, historical, hospitable and joyful mixture of students training.
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APRO
Asia Pacific Regional Office
I had my exchange program--experience in both community and hospital pharmacies--in Taipei. I spent the first 2 weeks in Din Tai Pharmacy, a community pharmacy. I really had fun along with 3 other pharmacy students from Taipei doing their attachment. For the 1st week, we learnt how to read prescriptions and to pack and dispense medication. It was really difficult for me at first because I am used to reading prescriptions in
SEP in TAIWAN
English rather than in Chinese, but I eventually got use to it. The validity of the prescription is different from that in Singapore. In Taiwan, medications must be collected within the stipulated dates (usually within 3 days) in the prescription. For chronic disease continuous prescription is valid for three months starting from the issuing day and chronic patients can be given thirty days medications each time according to the severity of their diseases. There must at least be a minimum period of 1 week before the
SEP in TAIWAN
repeat collection can be made. In Singapore, all prescriptions are valid for 1 year from the date that the prescription is written. We also went through health supplements and over-the-counter (OTC) items. It was fun discussing these topics because it was like a refresher course for me, except that it was all in Chinese. The next 2 weeks were spent in Shuang-Ho Hospital, where I had a chance to experience what a Taiwanese hospital pharmacist does every day. Some of the things I did included going on infectious disease ward rounds, with the head clinical pharmacist and an infectious disease doctor, observing aseptic preparation of total parenteral nutrition and chemotherapy products in their clean room, as well as evaluate new drugs that are potential candidates to be included into the hospital formulary. The clean room was interesting because in Singapore, most of the hospitals outsource their aseptic preparations to external companies and few of us rarely get a chance to enter a clean room. As for drug evaluation, I had to compare variables such as strength, appearance, FDA approved indication, cost and dosages between 2 non-ergoline dopamine agonist. I learnt how to source for primary literature efficiently and find relevant articles to help me with the evaluation of the drugs. I was always looking forward to joining the activities after work as there were always friendly Taiwanese students who brought us around Taipei for dinner and sight-seeing. Every night was filled with activities such as visiting night markets and tourist attractions around Taipei. We even went for foot massage at 2am in the morning! Weekends were especially fun because we get to travel out of Taipei to other parts of Taiwan, such as Hualien, Kaohsiung and Taichung. During these trips we get to meet and interact with other exchange students from other countries, who were assigned to other parts of Taiwan. I felt that this exchange program has been really enriching in terms of knowledge and social events. I learnt a lot of new things and seen differences between how pharmacists work in Taiwan and in Singapore. During the trip, I also made many friends including exchange students from other countries such as the USA, Poland, Hong Kong, Canada, and of course, including many of our hosts in Taiwan.
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EU
Europe
SEP in PORTUGAL
the pharmacist. I made good friends at the pharmacy that I am still in contact with. During my stay at the students residence I made many friends from all over the world, and it was really fun, especially when it came to the traditional food. I went to Lisbon with another colleague so for the first days we visited the city by ourselves, but after we made friends also from the SEP and other internships (like medicine and
I arrived in Portugal on the 1st of August and left it behind at the very end of the month. I wanted to visit Lisbon since I saw pictures of it a couple of years ago and I was not disappointed at all. It was the most fulfilling experience I have ever had in every aspect possible: educational, social, and cultural. When I first arrived I was in total amazement due to the fact that my position to work in research at the university was no longer available. This situation did not last long because the girls in charge of the programme were very quick to find me a place to do my practice in the Algarve Pharmacy. I was very lucky to do my practice there, as all the staff was extremely helpful. I did learn many things while working there. I learned how to take the inventory, take care of a pharmacy, receive the medicine, and even how to interact with the patients. I found it odd that there were some differences regarding the health system between my country (Romania) and Portugal like: on our prescriptions the patients diagnosis is written as well as the type of patient (student, chronic disease) which I consider to be very helpful for
SEP in PORTUGAL
with a great view of the river. That place with the Fado music gave me a feeling like I was in a Shakespeare play. Besides Lisbon I had the chance to visit Sintra, which I particularly loved. To my shame I did not love it for the castles, though they were magnificent, but for the Toys Museum. I like to collect toys as a hobby, and the collection they had made mine insignificant . At this museum I had the privilege to meet the owner of all the toys, and he was so kind as to tell me how he managed to collect this many, and which ones were his childhood toys. To sum it up, I will surely come back as I already miss the Pasteis de Belem (a delicious cookie) and most of all, the people I met there. I had the time of my life during August: I learned just how great it is to work in a relaxed environment, with people that can actually teach you something. I also had the chance to practically live in Lisbon, and see how life is there even if only for a month.
biology) we visited in groups. We took a map and started to mark places we needed to see. Pretty soon we learned that we had to see all of Lisbon and some places more than once. My personal favorites during the day was a great garden in Belem on top of the Cultural Center that I fell in love with immediately, and during the night the busy Bairro Alto where we would go and sing along with a guy playing guitar. Here I met a lot of interesting people, and I discovered they were mainly tourists. I heard about the place and we tried to find it for several days, but what we did not know was that we circled the place many times. Another place that was very dear to me was Alfama. The electric bus left us near the most beautiful terrace that I have every seen,
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AfRO
African Regional Office
I have mixed feelings when I think back on my time in Ghana. I applied for a four-week internship in a hospital pharmacy and that is what I was promised to get. Once in Ghana, I was told there were bureaucratic problems so I couldnt start working there yet. The contact student who was in charge of me offered an alternative: I could work in a community pharmacy. I thought this could be a good experience too, so I agreed. After I worked in the community pharmacy for three whole weeks, during which I annoyed my contact student nearly every day of the third week with the same question (when can I start working in the hospital pharmacy?), I was finally allowed to work at the KNUST University Hospital. It was much more interesting to work there. They had a laboratory (in contrast to the community pharmacy) and I could see how they manufacture drugs there. They also allowed me to walk through the different hospital areas and see everything. Indeed I have to say that the hygiene
SEP in GHANA
Internship in a Ghanaian community pharmacy and in the KNUST university hospital.
standards take getting used to, especially for a hospital. The work in the community pharmacy was very monotonous and it was strange to see how the costumers are treated there. Unless they are friends with the staff, they have to wait for a very long time. They have to be very patient. Despite all this, I also experienced very positive things! The colleagues at both pharmacies I
worked in were very kind and if I had any questions they tried to make things clear. I learned much about the common diseases, malaria and HIV. One day a friend took me to a church service so I could experience the beliefs of the people. It was fun to sing and dance with all of them. The only confusing thing was that the priest (like every Ghanaian) always changed languages from English to Twi (the language of the Ashanti), which made it hard for me to follow the service. About 80% of the Kumasi population is Christian and
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SEP in GHANA
the huge and palatial do not really fit in the area they are built in, surrounded by all this poverty. It also took some time to become familiar with all the languages spoken in Ghana. Every region has its own unofficial language and although they are taught English in school, most children (and adults) speak better Twi than English. There are many illiterate people and people who do not speak English, especially in the rural areas, making understanding each other quite hard. The tourism in Kumasi is sparse. There are not many foreigners so I attracted peoples attention wherever I went, so it was not surprising that everyone wanted to talk to me. Some friendly, some more intrusive. Children ran by just to feel how the Bronnies white skin feels like (Bronni means white man). It can be said that foreigners are treated differently here in Ghana, where they tend to pay a higher price for everything. Despite Ghana being a beautiful country, it is sad to witness the pollution that occurs daily, with trash being a common occurrence everywhere I turn. The hostel where I stayed was okay but a little expensive (20 per day) for a single room in which electricity and water cuts are normal business to be dealt with. I did this internship outside the normal exchange period (which would be in summer). The students were in the
middle of their semester. The disadvantage of this was that no one had time for me, so I often walked around the city on my own. The advantage was that I had the opportunity to see normal student life. I visited the faculties and also joined a normal Ghanaian class. Before I left for Germany I stayed one night in Accra (the capital city of Ghana). Here I could experience normal Ghanaian life. I shared my room with family friends of my contact student and ate with them out of a huge bowl with just our hands. We did some sightseeing and partied. All in all I would say tat this internship was a great experience to see an authentic Ghana with many disadvantages and advantages.
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Special Edition
Special Edition
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Community pharmacists are fully aware that there will be many significant challenges to overcome, within and without the profession. We will have to embrace threats as opportunities in order to advance our practice, and incorporate new tasks into our daily activities to guarantee a viable business model - hence attaining our common vision for pharmacy.
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By becoming an individual member of FIP you will automatically become a member of the Section of your choice. We invite and encourage you to interact with peers and colleagues with similar interests from all over the world, both virtually within online discussion forums on the FIP Website and in person at the annual FIP World Congress. Further information about the Community Pharmacy Section of FIP is available at www. fip.org/community_pharmacy. We look forward to welcoming you in the profession!
Ema Paulino Vice-President 2010-12 Community Pharmacy Section International Pharmaceutical Federation (FIP)
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