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| Pharmacist John Calhoun, left, owner of Cape Fear Discount Drugs, and his intern | ||
| Fayetteville Observer Photo |
After years of traveling across southern North Carolina filling prescriptions, John Calhoun was exhausted and fed up with his profession.
He had envisioned a career where, as a pharmacist, he had enough staff to conduct business in a relatively stress-free environment and provide proper customer service, things he said was missing in his days with chain stores.
So in 2003, Calhoun opened Cape Fear Discount Drugs as a solution to the problem.
Calhoun’s frustrations aren’t unusual. In fact, his concerns are echoed in pharmacies throughout the country about a profession that is experiencing a critical shortage of manpower.
By 2020, there will be a predicted shortfall of as many as 157,000 pharmacists, according to the American Association of Colleges of Pharmacy.
Today, pharmacists nationwide fill more than 3 billion drug orders a year, reports the National Association of Chain Drug Stores. And that number is expected to escalate as baby boomers age and more sophisticated drugs are developed. The problem, experts say, is that demand is exceeding supply.
Fewer druggists means higher salaries, multiple job offers for graduates and heavier workloads.
“The number of prescriptions and drug orders is increasing at a rate of approximately 68 percent per year, while the number of graduates is increasing by a rate of only 8 percent,” said Dr. William Stagner, professor of pharmaceutical sciences and director of the Pharmaceutical Sciences Institute at Campbell University.
To help meet the demand, some schools have increased class size. In 2002, the University of North Carolina partnered with Elizabeth City State University to create a joint pharmacy program. Students in Elizabeth City attend classes via video conferencing and a few days a month the instructor teaches in person. The program allowed UNC to increase its class size from 120 to 145.
In 2003, Wingate University opened its school of pharmacy with 61 students. Today, there are 70 students in the program.
The number of pharmacy schools nationwide swelled to 92 in 2005 and this year is expected to reach 100. Three of those schools are in North Carolina.
Some experts say that increasing class size isn’t going to ease the immediate burden pharmacists are feeling in their jobs.
Calhoun and Stagner say increasing pharmacy technician duties might be an option.
Last year, there were more than 140,000 certified technicians in the country, according to the Pharmacy Technician Certification Board. Of that, more than 5,000 work in North Carolina.
“When you don’t have enough technicians, that’s how you get into two, three, four hour waits,” Calhoun said.
They perform administrative duties, which reduces the pharmacist’s workload, which means he can spend more time counseling customers.
Cape Fear Discount Drugs has four technicians and four cashiers who help fill about 3,000 prescriptions under three pharmacists’ watch.
Stagner says the druggist shortage breeds other problems, such as a lack of scientists and professors.
About 20 percent of pharmacy professors leave their careers to pursue positions in retail, hospital or clinical pharmacy, which often pay better wages, or leave for jobs in the industry, Stagner said.
The average pharmacist in America earned $96,537 in 2004, according to a survey by Drug Topics magazine. Pharmacists who worked in discount/mass-merchandising stores brought in $93,442, and independent pharmacists made about $9,000 less.
Stagner doesn’t have a solution to retaining staff or enticing students to choose academia over retail pharmacy. But he does know that an aging faculty and shortage of community pharmacists doesn’t help.
“Education is key to solving these shortages. The U.S. faces a serious and long-term faculty shortage when 37 percent of the pharmacy school faculty is the age of 50 or older and 24 percent of the deans are 60 or over,” Stagner said. “Forty percent of the faculty vacancies go unfilled for six months to two years.”
If more schools followed UNC and Elizabeth City’s lead and share resources, that might help the schools grow and turn out more pharmacists.
Another answer may be hiring industrial professionals like Campbell did with Stagner. He worked in product development for more than 25 years and has taught at Campbell for the last two years.
Whatever the answer, Calhoun and Stagner say the problem isn’t disappearing anytime soon.
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