Ten years into this profession, I often question why I didn’t follow a more “ordinary” career path. The honest answer is that I’ve been lucky to have great mentors who believed in me even though I didn’t fully know where I was going.
Along the way, I’ve struggled to believe in myself at times. But I’ve also had people who saw potential in my ideas before I could fully articulate them. I share my story in the hope it resonates with a pharmacist who has a vision, even if they can’t yet see a clear path.
I qualified from the University of Copenhagen in 2016. During my studies, I often wondered whether pharmacy was truly for me. After taking a gap year to do research, one thing became clear: pharmacy was my profession, but not in the same way it was for everyone around me.
I’ve always believed in preventive medicine and in understanding how our everyday habits and beliefs shape how we use medicines. Working across community pharmacy, academia, primary care, and corporate settings has reinforced that we are excellent at the clinical side of healthcare but far less equipped for the human side of it.
That gap became personal during my third pregnancy, when I was diagnosed with gestational diabetes for the third time. As a clinical pharmacist specialising in type 2 diabetes, I was told I needed insulin. The conversation focused entirely on treatment. Nobody asked how my pregnancy was going, how I was sleeping, my stress levels, or what my day-to-day looked like.
I remember thinking: if I’m not being asked these questions, what is happening to everyone else?
That experience deepened my interest in behaviour change and prevention. Medication is essential, but for many people it is only part of the answer. Advice such as “eat better and move more” assumes people have the time, headspace, and capability to act on it. For those who are trying to juggle work, life, kids, and everything in between, that assumption is the whole problem.
That is why I believe pharmacists have an important role to play in prevention. We are often the most accessible healthcare professionals, speaking to people regularly and at moments that matter. We already have their trust. What we don’t always have is the confidence, or the system support, to step beyond the prescription and ask: how are you actually doing, and what would make this easier for you to manage?
To me, that is what a “prescription for behaviour change” means. We are not just dispensers of medicine. With our training and experience we are well-positioned to support people to change, by asking about the human story before we write the prescription.
I know what some of you are thinking: there isn’t time for that in a ten-minute consultation. But if the system doesn’t allow space for the conversations that improve health outcomes, perhaps that’s exactly what we need to change.
If my career path appears unconventional, it’s because I was following a version of pharmacy I hadn’t yet seen modelled. To any pharmacist with an idea that doesn’t fit a traditional path: take it seriously anyway. As a wise mentor once told me, you are resourceful.
Dr Sara Ramzan
PDA view
It is always positive to hear from members who have been able to find a way to use their qualifications in a manner which hugely benefits patients whilst providing them with a fulfilling career. Sadly, not all members can exercise the autonomy described to devote extended time to the patients they provide care to, mainly due to organisational pressure.
The PDA has and will continue to call for systemic and organisational changes which support pharmacists to provide effective care making best use of their unique skills, optimising patient safety and treatment outcomes and ultimately supporting the NHS plan and population health objectives.
Some key requirements:
General practice
Pharmacists must be allotted adequate time for the following activities, otherwise existing errors and issues may remain unaddressed:
- Review/reauthorise/generate repeat prescriptions,
- Carry out all types of medication review (including structured medication review which required a series of consultations if changes to therapy are being made)
- Process hospital correspondence and patient queries.
Community pharmacy
The current community pharmacy model cannot be safely overseen by a lone Responsible Pharmacist.
Implementation of a two-pharmacist model facilitates safe and effective delivery of:
- the growing number of clinical services required under the community pharmacy contract
- the advent of community based independent prescribing
- the pressure to provide increasing numbers of private prescribing services
- the ongoing need for immediately available pharmacist advice and thorough clinical checking of prescriptions.
Hospital pharmacy
Adequate time to provide meaningful ward pharmacy patient reviews – reducing pharmacists’ ability to review patient prescriptions thoroughly and regularly increases the risk of patient harm.
In all of these settings, pharmacists are well placed to provide a more holistic approach to patient care including advice on behaviour change where appropriate – if given the time to do so.
Learn more
- Dr Sara Ramzan | Health Behaviour Specialist | Holistic Lifestyle Clinic
- Diabetes Expert: Dr Sara Ramzan
Not yet a PDA member?
If you have not yet joined the PDA, we encourage you to join today and ask your colleagues to do the same.
Membership is FREE to pharmacy students, trainee pharmacists, and for the first three months of being newly qualified.
Read about our key member benefits here.