Pharmacy Policy and Health Systems Reform Forum

The School of Pharmacy, Monash University Malaysia, had the privilege of hosting the Pharmacy Policy and Health Systems Reform Forum on 20th November 2023. It was a half-day event that sought to discuss the urgency of reforming pharmacy practice and policy post-pandemic. The forum brought together policymakers, healthcare professionals, researchers, pharmacy, and healthcare stakeholders interested in learning about the challenges, barriers, solutions, and pathways for policy and system change within the diverse healthcare systems in the Asia-Pacific.

We were honored to have some distinguished speakers who shared their expertise. Our first speaker was Mr. John Jackson, who gave an insightful overview on the links between pharmacy practice and policy, the policy development cycle, as well as the application of policy theory supported by case studies of global health systems. Mr. Kevin Ben L. was our second speaker and he introduced the audience to a comprehensive breakdown of the National Pharmacy Strategy (NPS) adopted by the Singaporean Ministry of Health.

Our final speaker was Dr. Mark Cheong who focused on research being a driver of health systems and policy reform. His talk gave the audience much to think about as we learnt about the factors of research process, content and outcome that ultimately support policy development or changes that are evidence-based.

The session ended with an interactive panel discussion followed by questions from the audience on topics such as the barriers of implementing state-/system-wide policies, ways to improve stakeholder engagement, strategies to deal with dominant stakeholder groups and opinions shared on the feasibility of adopting dispensing separation in the healthcare system.

Overall, this was a valuable session that brought together an enthusiastic group of policymakers, academics and healthcare professionals eager to tackle pressing healthcare issues through the lens of health policy.

#healthpolicy #healthcarematters #pharmacy #pharmacist