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As pharmacists increasingly step into clinical spaces, prescribing, diagnosing, and managing patient care, a critical question emerges: How do we ensure public trust and safety?
The answer lies in standards. Accreditation standards are the quiet force shaping safe, effective, and patient-centred care. As healthcare professionals undertake further training to expand their scope of practice, standards are the backbone of public trust and professional accountability.
I reflect on where the pharmacy profession has come from and where it’s heading globally. When I trained as a pharmacist in the 1980s, our education was product-focused: pharmacology, drug delivery systems, and compounding. It was more about the medicine and less about the person. We were trained to prepare medicines and back then, I didn’t know what professional standards were when I was at uni. What I do remember though, is seeing a need for our training to shift towards the patient, not just the product. I remember I voiced a desire for more clinical content and more focus on patients – likely to the annoyance of my educators I imagine at that time.
Today, pharmacy education and standards have evolved – they are centred on patient care. They reflect a profession that is socially accountable, culturally safe, and outcomes driven.
Accreditation standards ensure both pharmacy graduates and practising pharmacists looking to upskill are equipped to serve diverse communities, collaborate across healthcare teams, and treat people as people - not just as cases or prescriptions.
And it’s not just graduates - practising pharmacists build this capability through ongoing professional development. Pharmacists are required to meet their CPD obligations through undertaking ongoing training with reputable, high-quality organisations that support safe and contemporary practice, many of whom are developing their own quality standards to ensure this is upheld.
Pharmacists are the most accessible healthcare professionals in Australia. With over 440 million individual patient visits annually, they are uniquely positioned to deliver frontline care.
But alongside the need for expanded roles comes the need for clear, trusted standards that underpin training. They assure the public and the broader healthcare community that a pharmacist is ready and qualified to deliver additional services.
In the absence of such standards, it’s not surprising that both healthcare professionals and the public may hesitate. Without standards, uncertainty grows. Questions like “How do I know my pharmacist is safe to prescribe this medicine?” are valid. Accreditation standards are designed to answer them. Our standards align with the National Prescribing Competencies Framework and embed essential clinical skills, ensuring pharmacists are prepared, safe, and supported.
While Australia has been slower than some other nations in empowering pharmacists to work to their full scope, recent reforms signal a shift that I welcome wholeheartedly. Expanding scope isn’t just about professional growth, it’s about meeting the needs of our communities. As scope evolves, standards must evolve in tandem to ensure safety, consistency, and confidence across the healthcare system.
Collaboration across professions is key
Working together is critical. Right now, unity, collaboration, and trust are more important than ever - globally. We must work together, not apart. Our communities are relying on pharmacists to collaborate, on health professions to support one another, and on leaders to make decisions that serve the public good.
Interprofessional education is now a foundational element of our undergraduate training. Our standards empower pharmacists to work confidently across diverse settings, integrating smoothly into broader healthcare team.
This leads me to referral pathways. Working to full scope means to understand referral pathways deeply. Pharmacists are often naturally the first point of contact for Primary Health care conditions, and pharmacists frequently refer people on to GPs or emergency rooms. We know most pharmacists have excellent relationships with their local GPs.
Full scope training includes clear guidance on referral and documentation - key elements of prescribing standards that support continuity of care and reduce fragmentation, ensuring that all healthcare providers are on the same page. It supports continuity, builds trust, and enables pharmacists to safely take on expanded roles within a well-connected system.
The approach we take matters
Our approach to developing standards is a collaborative, consultative, and rigorous process - one that reflects the values of the profession and the expectations of the public.
The development process includes the voices of consumers, students, Indigenous communities, academics, and a broad range of stakeholders through our Accreditation Committee, Working Groups, and public consultations. When it comes to developing anything new, we listen. As accreditation authorities, we cannot assume we know what people want - we need to ask.
Person-centred standards lead to person-centred curricula.
This has been an evolution – this inclusive approach is now a requirement under the National Registration and Accreditation Scheme (NRAS), which mandates that all accreditation authorities engage meaningfully with stakeholders. Accreditation recognises the value of including all the stakeholders including the consumers as a part of the development of the standards.
In a recent conversation with a colleague, we reflected on how far the profession has come since our early days as pharmacy students and how modern standards are developed.
Kate Spencer is a pharmacist and Executive Director of Accreditation and Assessment at APC.
“The evolution of pharmacy has been shaped, in large part, by the standards that underpin it. Though they may not always be visible to students or practitioners, standards have always been there, quietly guiding curriculum, practice, and professional identity.
“We use a two-phase consultation process – preliminary and public - to ensure transparency and a broad range of input across all voices.
“We use evidence through literature reviews and environmental scans in the early stages of the development aligning it to contemporary best practice and global trends. At a minimum, we review our pharmacy program standards every five years, and more frequently when professional practice changes,” Kate concluded.
Final thoughts
Pharmacy students graduate with a broader skill set than many people realise. When supported to work to their full scope, they can intervene earlier and provide timely, local care without unnecessary delays – and reducing pressure on emergency and specialist services.
And with the right standards in place, all health professionals - not just pharmacists - can practise to their full potential.
As pharmacists continue to expand their roles, standards will remain our compass, ensuring that progress is not only possible, but safe, ethical, and patient-centred.