finally i did it..

salamm.. finally i did my so-called job attachment… at hospital sultanah nur zahirah (HSNZ)

it was not actually a job attachment but more like an exposure to the reality of a phamacist’s world. i wanted to do for like at least 2 days, but there’s nothing much i can do but sitting there and watch them working. the real thing is that i’m absolutely ‘zero’ in this pharmacy thingy. not knowing how to calculate the amount of sufficient dosage, the concentration of this and that, not knowing the side effect of this drug n blablabla.. so even the head of pharmacy department did not know what kind of task can be handed over to me.. so she decided to just show me every branch of clinical pharmacy.. so i decided one day would be more than enough..

i was guided by a PRP (provisional registered pharmacist) syafiq, or maybe i should say a FRP (fully registered pharmacist) because he’s done with the pre-registration and now waiting for his placement to do his 3 years compulsory service. these are the places that we went  :

1) supply and storage :

this is where every single supply of medicines or medical instruments are stored before being supplied to each departments in the hospital. all medicines are stored under room temperature such as 25C and some are stored at cold temperature (2C-9C), this is mostly true for injection liquid like insulin. a pharmacy officer is incharged in this deparment. ensure the availability of each product, manage in-and-out of each item and deal with the manufacturer and …

2) ICC :

im not sure of the abbreviation and what it stands for.. i would say this is the busiest branch compared to others.. this is where outpatients will go n take their medical prescription written by the doctors, over the counter (OTC). this is not the first-come-first-serve basis. first of all, the pharmacists will screen the prescriptions, to ensure its reliability, approve it and give the waiting numbers according to the patients condition and age. some patients might have to wait up to 2 hours to get their medicines..

the dispensing, packaging and labelling of medicines all happen in this department as some medicines are bought in bulk. this usually for the weekly or monthly-basis-medicines. besides, the syrup-type-medicines are also prepared here. where tablets will be crashed into powder using mortar and pestle and then being added with some kind of substances which i forgot.. forming syrup..

3) satellite pharmacy :

the one that supplies medicines to the inpatients. the job is more or less the same, screen the medical prescription, approve it, dispense and supply.

4) TDM (therapeutics drug monitoring) :

measure the medication level in blood. there is a specific machine for this purpose by taking the sample of patients’ blood. this especially for drugs that have narrow therapeutics range which means those which can easily be under or over dosed. eg vancomycin, gentamicin and phenytoin. insufficient levels will lead to undertreatment or resistance, and excessive levels can lead to toxicity and tissue damage. basically this branch of clinical pharmacy involves lots of calculation.

this procedure is usually done when the doctors want to monitor the medication level or when there is suspicion of toxicity in the patients’ blood. lets say, toxicity occurs, the pharmacist will suggest to either increase/decrease the dosage amount of the drug given to the patients with the suggested amount.

5) TPN (total parenteral nutrition … kot) :

preparing the IV liquid for the patients, mostly babies n those who cant consume orally. its prepared in a specialised room, apparel and condition to ensure that the substances are sterilised. some of the contents of the liquid are glucose, lipids, salts, amino acids and vitamins according to their specific proportion.

6) TDR (kot.. cant remember) :

not quite sure the exact role.. but it deals with the preparation for drug regiment. especially for cancer diseases. the drugs are mostly expensive and dangerous. thus only well trained pharmacists are allowed to perform the task.

7) DIS/DIC (drug information service/drug information centre)

i guess thats all kot.. anyway im writing this post merely based of my memory.. do correct me if there’s any mistakes. thus i hereby declare that the reliability of this post is 70%