What are the skills needed to be a pharmacist in New Zealand?

With good job opportunities and the chance to earn a good salary, it’s not surprising that pharmacist jobs are popular in New Zealand.

This is a skilled profession that requires you to have certain qualifications in order to get on the ladder. In this article, we’ll explore the hard skills that pharmacists need in their day-to-day roles, and also go into some of the other traits and competencies that employers want to see. The idea is that you come out of reading this armed with the right knowledge and phrases to use when writing your CV or preparing for a job interview.

There are a couple of important stepping stones on the way to becoming a pharmacist in New Zealand:

• Studying a Bachelor of Pharmacy: These are four year courses, and are offered by both the University of Otago and University of Auckland. 
• Completing an internship: This will typically involve spending a year, or more if you want to, in a professional health setting. Most commonly, this will be a community pharmacy or hospital. 

Once you’ve jumped through these hoops, you’ll need to register with the Pharmacy Council of New Zealand. This is a professional organisation that was set up to safeguard quality standards for pharmaceutical employees, and you’ll have to register in order to practice as a pharmacist.

Your university qualification and internship experience will provide you with some of the key hard skills you’ll use on a daily basis when you’re working as a pharmacist. These include:

1. Maths and science skills

Top notch maths skills are vital for pharmacists to be able to measure the correct doses for drugs, place orders for stocks and ensure the correct amount of medication is dispensed to each patient. It goes without saying, but you can’t be making mistakes in any of these tasks, so you’ll be relying on your maths skills on a daily basis.

When it comes to science, understanding how the different drugs you stock impact the body is key when you’re giving out advice for over-the-counter medication, and will also allow you to talk with confidence about any prescriptions you’re filling for customers.

2. Technology skills

These will be important during your internship, as you’ll find yourself using computer databases for all sorts of tasks, ranging from storing customer information, ordering stock and communicating with GPs and other health facilities.

As well as being able to use the relevant software packages efficiently to enable a smooth workflow, you’ll also need to ensure customer privacy every step of the way, as you’ll be handling sensitive health data on a daily basis.

2. Communication

In addition to empathy and discretion, you’ll need to be able to communicate clearly with patients about the medications they’re picking up. For obvious reasons, it’s vital that they understand how and when they should be taking their medication, as well as any potential side effects and foods or activities to avoid doing while they’re taking it.

It’s important to understand that, while you have years of university learning as well as your professional experience under your belt, you’ll often be communicating with people who have little to no knowledge of medication. This means you’ll need to be able to explain these concepts in plain english and ensure the message gets across.

As a pharmacist, you’ll be wearing multiple hats. In a single day, you’ll find yourself providing health advice, performing administration tasks such as ordering in stock and also selling goods, to name but a few potential tasks.

Due to the importance of pharmacies to the local communities they serve, it’s crucial that you’re able to perform each of these functions to schedule, while also ensuring utmost attention to detail. This is where the internship you complete before fully diving into the professional role will equip you with the skills and experience you’ll need to be a great pharmacist.