HEALTH DIRECTOR ADVICES PHARMACY COUNCIL (PAGE 35, SEPT 15, 2010)

THE Deputy Volta Regional Director of Pharmaceutical Services Department of the Ghana Health Service (GHS), Mr Divine Azameti, has called on the Pharmacy Council to take appropriate measures to fill the gap in the delivery of efficient pharmaceutical services in rural areas.
He noted that nursing service delivery was improving in rural areas with the introduction of health aid assistants after the phasing out of the enrolled nurses. He, therefore, suggested that the gesture must be equally replicated in the pharmaceutical sector with Medicine Counter Assistants (MCAs) to replace dispensing assistants, whose system has been phased out.
Mr Azameti, who is the Director of the Volta Health Consult for the Training of MCAs, made the call at the second graduation ceremony of two batches of 210 MCAs at Ho.
He said pharmaceutical service delivery in the Volta Region was in public health facilities rather than in community pharmacies. Mr Azameti added that with the retirement of the last batch of dispensing assistants from the GHS, coupled with the delay in employing pharmacy technicians and pharmacists, pharmaceutical service delivery in health centres was left in the hands of nurses who are already overburdened.
He said most of the hospitals in the region had one pharmacist and a technician most of whom would retire by the end of next year.
Mr Azameti, therefore, stressed the need for more hands to undertake duties like cleaning, pre-packing and recording.
“All the hospitals need the services of the MCAs as an employable member of the pharmaceutical health team,” he emphasised.
In an address read on his behalf, the Registrar of the Pharmacy Council, Mr Joseph Nyoagbe, said the role of the MCAs was critical to access to pharmaceutical care with a view to reducing mortality rate in the society.
He disclosed that 16 MCA training institutions had been accredited in the country and that a total of 2,322 MCAs had been trained nationwide.
Mr Nyoagbe advised the MCAs to operate with absolute virtues in order to justify their inclusion in the pharmaceutical team.
The Volta Regional Manager of the Pharmacy Council, Mr Christian Quao, said the pharmaceutical care team could not be guaranteed good service delivery without the role of MCAs, stressing that they were as important as any other member of the team.
The chairman for the occasion, Mr Frederick Asare, said professions groomed practitioners to the taste of their trade.
He expressed the hope that the graduates would deliver to pass the test of time as they entered the pharmaceutical field, which is considered as a noble profession.