The outgoing Registrar, Pharmacy Council of Nigeria, (PCN), Dr Elijah Mohammed, says the Council has been repositioned to deliver effective Pharmacy Practice in Nigeria.
Dr Mohammed stated this in Abuja at the presentation of his scorecard as the registrar of the PCN in the last eight years.
Dr Mohammed explained that he came up with a vision to work with Council members, stakeholders and staff of PCN by putting in place a pharmacy practice that is generational in thought, actions and deeds; and ultimately promotes the tenets of the profession to meet the needs of patients.
The Registrar of PCN stated that the mission and vision to transform PCN was hinged on 4 point Agenda, which guided the operations and activities of the council in the last eight years.
‘’I also set up a mission to create societal change agents out of career professionals (Pharmacists and Pharmacy personnel) through self-transformation as intellectual practitioners with good moral courage In order to drive the mission and vision, I came up with a 4-point Agenda as follow: Repositioning the REGISTRY for Effective Service Delivery, Institutionalization of Good Pharmacy Practice (GPP) in Nigeria, Transformation of Career Professionals into Intellectual Practitioners, and New Partnership for Progress Initiative (NP4PI).
I was much aware that the repositioning of the Registry for effective regulation in addition to ensuring effective implementation of Council policies was an enormous task. However, I was confident that my team and I would deliver’’.
The Registry team was therefore determined to confront all limitations and challenges in order to achieve the goal of raising the bar and attaining global standards.
Dr Mohammed explained that the PCN institutionalised global best practices through transparency and accountability of its activities and operations.
The Governing Council also inspired me to have a profession and practice which would be outstanding and possibly the best in the West Africa region as well as being recognized globally. This noble goal required a total transformation of the pharmaceutical sector through institutionalization of global best practices. The vehicle to reach the set destination was definitely transparency and accountability and this became our motto in PCN
Dr Mohammed outlined Other steps taken to achieve the four-point Agenda to include, a management retreat Tagged a new mindset for the new game organised to identify the strengths weaknesses, opportunities, and threats to the entire system.
According to him, the retreat gave room for re-evaluation of the administrative processes, machineries on ground, skills, and capabilities of the personnel.
This strategic planning and management technique greatly engineered the management to chart a course for navigation to our destination and in essence the future.
I am delighted therefore to inform this August audience that PCN has indeed come a long way since the journey commenced. We came, saw and conquered during this administration, Indeed, this success is attributable to the Federal Ministry of Health and all stakeholders in the pharmaceutical sector who cooperated and supported PCN all the wayOur achievement so far was recently endorsed by the recent attainment of the ISO 9001:2015 by PCN in 2022.
While acknowledging that there is still much to be done for the pharmacy practice, Dr Elijah Mohammed expressed the hope that his successor will make pharmacy a cynosure of all professions in Nigeria.
Earlier, the Chairman, of the Senate Committee on Health Dr. Ibrahim Oloriegbe tasked stakeholders in the health sector to be transparent in their operations to ensure good and quality healthcare delivery in Nigeria.
Senator Oloriegbe who applauded the giant strides of the PCN pledged continuous support to the council with legislation that would enhance their activities.
In their separate goodwill messages, the representative of Bill and Melinda gates Mrs. Rodio Diallo, and the society for family health Dr. Omokhudu Idogho also pledged continued collaboration with the Nigerian government to improve health outcomes by ensuring communities have access to affordable, quality, and gender-sensitive health services and commodities.
On her part, the Director-General of NAFDAC professor Mojisola Adeyeye said the existing relationship between NAFDAC and the PCN would enable the two organisations achieve more in safer drug distribution in the country.
Reporting by Maureen Eke, editing by Daniel Adejo