Last February 2, 2018 (Friday), the Faculty of Pharmacy and Mercury Drug Corporation inaugurated the Pharmaceutical Care Laboratory, a simulation of an actual drug store, for the undergraduate (BSPhar) and doctor of pharmacy (PharmD) students.
Under the supervision of Pharmacy faculty members, PharmD and senior BSPhar students will deliver pharmaceutical services, including dispensing, patient counselling, and responding to inquiries.
According to Pharmacy Dean Aleth Therese L. Dacanay, RPh, PhD, the laboratory is one concrete step toward the realization of the goals of outcomes-based education.
Dacanay said that “the presence of the medical response unit is aimed at proving expert and professional advice regarding medication, to offer a safer alternative to patient-initiated Google searches.”
Spirit of service
In her speech, Mercury Drug Corporation President Vivian Que-Azcona, RPh, an alumna of UST Pharmacy Batch 1977, said that the donated pharmaceutical care laboratory and county bus were the company’s contribution to “academic advancement and community service.” “It is our ardent wish that these will be used in the same spirit of service that it was given,” Que-Azcona noted. With the new laboratory, Que-Azcona said that Mercury Drug “hopes that students will be stimulated to play a vital role in community health, to be right in the center with interacting with patients in giving information and drugs and counsel on their safe use.”
A long-standing partnership
The recent turnover of the laboratory and the county bus is the continuation of UST’s long-standing partnership with Mercury Drug Corporation, which has been providing scholarship grants for future pharmacists. In 2015, MDC founder, the late Mariano Que, was conferred the Doctor of Humanities, honoris causa, degree, during which time he expressed pride at having hundreds of Mercurians who were honed in the University of Santo Tomas.
