Pharmacist - Pharmacist - Activity

2023 Author: Wallace Forman | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-11-27 18:19

Pharmacist

The pharmacists ensure that the population is properly supplied with medicines. In addition to prescription and non-prescription drugs, the pharmacist in a public pharmacy also deals with medicinal plants and products that serve health in the broadest sense - from dressings to special cosmetics, from contraceptives to baby food. They advise, inform and help.

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• more on the subject
• Official job title
• Tasks and work areas
• Solid education
• How are the costs going to be covered?
• Informative links
• Legal basis

Official job title

Pharmacist

Tasks and work areas

The pharmacy is a diverse field of activity: In the interests of the greatest possible drug safety, every public pharmacy, for example, must have its own laboratory in which drugs are examined for their identity. The pharmacist also carries out health analyzes and checks and advises patients in person.

The industrial production of pharmaceuticals has not changed anything about the fact that pharmacies are still producing pharmaceuticals themselves according to medical prescriptions (magistral preparation). In many pharmacies there are also so-called “house specialties” such as over-the-counter medicines, tea mixtures, syrups, drops, capsules, etc., which the pharmacist produces according to his own recipes. When a patient comes to the pharmacy with a doctor's prescription, the pharmacist checks the prescription for completeness and validity. In addition, she / he informs about the application (amount, time and duration of intake), explains the mode of action and possible undesirable effects (side effects and interactions) of the drugs. Pharmacists also make a significant contribution to the care of drug sufferers by dispensing the prescribed replacement drugs (substitution therapy) and ensuring that they are taken in a controlled manner.

Where do pharmacists work?

Pharmacists work in a wide variety of facilities. You work, for example, in public pharmacies, hospital pharmacies, in the (pharmaceutical) industry, in testing institutes or at universities. Pharmacists can exercise their profession in an employment relationship or independently by running a public pharmacy after being granted a license.

Solid education

Pharmacists complete at least a nine-semester diploma course in pharmacy at a university and then have to complete a year of professional experience (aspirant year). In order to obtain the professional license to work in a public or hospital pharmacy, you have to successfully pass the pharmacist exam at the Austrian Chamber of Pharmacists (state pharmacist diploma). As a prerequisite for the independent operation of a pharmacy, proof of five years of work in a pharmacy as a qualified pharmacist (quinquennium) is required.

Other professions in the pharmacy

Pharmaceutical-commercial assistance (PKA) is a teaching profession that is not a legally regulated health profession. The activities of the PKA include, for example, bookkeeping, accounting or inventory. In addition, the PKA may support the pharmacist in dispensing medication and sell goods that serve health in the broader sense, such as bandages or cosmetics. The PKA supports the pharmacist in the manufacture of drugs.

Further information is available from www.pkainfo.at and www.pkacircle.at.

How are the costs going to be covered?

Patients receive (prescription-only) medicines and other remedies with a valid health insurance or private prescription. In the case of a prescription, the patient has to pay the current prescription fee, unless the patient is exempt from the prescription fee or the price of the drug is below the prescription fee. The prescription is not only a "work order" for the pharmacist, but also serves as a receipt for the social security agency. In the statutory health insurance, the pharmacy settles accounts with the social security institutions via the pharmaceutical salary fund.

Private prescriptions from doctors of choice and hospital doctors without prescription authorization can be redeemed in the pharmacy without prior approval from the social security agency, but the patient has to bear the costs himself. A private prescription can be checked in advance with the responsible social security agency to see whether it can be equated with a health insurance prescription. In this case - apart from a possible prescription fee - there are no costs. There are also private prescriptions that cannot be redeemed at health insurance costs (e.g. anti-baby pills).

For more information on remedy cost coverage, see The Prescription.

Prescription fee and exemption

The prescription fee is a deductible that the patient has to pay for a drug. The fee is collected by the pharmacy for the social security agency and offset against the amount to be paid by the social security agency for the remedy. If the cost of the prescribed drug is less than the prescription fee, only this has to be paid. Under certain conditions there is the possibility of a prescription fee exemption.

For more information, see Prescription Fee Exemption.

Services and advice in pharmacies

Expert advice on pharmaceuticals is one of the core competencies of pharmacists. In a broader sense, they also give health advice on e.g. vaccinations, nutrition, exercise and quitting smoking. In addition to professional advice, pharmacists also offer health checks, such as measuring blood pressure or blood sugar. Depending on the pharmacy, such offers are free customer service or paid for privately.

Informative links

• Austrian Chamber of Pharmacists (legal representation of interests)
• Pharmaceutical Salary Fund for Austria (Social and Economic Institute of Austrian Pharmacists)
• Austrian Association of Pharmacists (licensed / independent pharmacists)
• Association of employed pharmacists in Austria (VAAÖ)
• Forum! Pharmacy (association for employed pharmacists in Austria)
• Brochure Health Professions in Austria from the BMSGPK
• Information on health professions on the BMSGPK website.
• General information on the Austrian Chamber of Pharmacists (health portal)
• Medicines from the Internet (health portal)

Legal basis

You can find relevant laws in the Legal Information System (RIS):

• Pharmacy Act 1906, RGBl. No. 5/1907, as amended
• Pharmaceutical Skilled Workers Ordinance, Federal Law Gazette No. 40/1930, as amended
• Pharmacists Act 2001, Federal Law Gazette I No. 111, as amended
• University Act 2002, Federal Law Gazette I. No. 120, as amended
• Professional Code of June 11, 2012