AdPha marks World Pharmacists Day by calling for sustainable workforce models that support safe, high-quality patient care.
On 2026 FIP World Pharmacists Day, Advanced Pharmacy Australia (AdPha) highlights the critical role of an empowered, sustainable hospital pharmacy workforce in delivering safe, high-quality care to Australians.
Under this year’s theme, ‘Empowering pharmacists for healthier futures’, FIP is calling for pharmacists to have the skills, recognition and system support needed to meet evolving health needs.
For Australia’s hospital pharmacy workforce, AdPha says empowerment must begin with the foundations of a sustainable workforce: safe staffing, meaningful career development, and recognition of advanced practice.
As outlined in AdPha’s The State of Pharmacy: Workforce Insights 2025 report, nearly three in four hospitals have reduced pharmacy services because of workforce constraints, while growing medicines complexity and demand for clinical pharmacy services continue to put pressure on the workforce.
AdPha President Assoc. Prof. Tom Simpson FANZCAP (Lead&Mgmt) said empowering pharmacists means creating the workforce conditions that allow them to deliver their full contribution to patient care.
“You cannot empower pharmacists to deliver more for patients without first giving them the workforce, career pathways and recognition they need to practise at their full capability.
“Hospital pharmacists are working with increasingly complex patients, medicines and care systems. The workforce must be equipped to meet that complexity – and that means investing in safe staffing, developing the next generation and recognising advanced expertise.
“A sustainable pharmacy workforce is not simply a workforce issue. It is a patient safety issue. When pharmacy teams have the capacity and capability to provide the right care at the right time, patients and health systems benefit.”
AdPha is calling for health services, governments, professional organisations and the pharmacy workforce to work together to build a sustainable hospital pharmacy workforce that can meet the needs of patients today and into the future.
Assoc. Prof. Simpson said recognising advanced practice was essential to retaining experienced pharmacists and strengthening clinical leadership.
“We have invested in building a highly skilled and diversified hospital pharmacy workforce, but expertise must be recognised if we are going to retain it.
“Advanced practice, endorsement, specialisation and Fellowship represent significant professional capability and contribution. Recognising that expertise through career structures and remuneration is an important part of building a workforce that can lead pharmacy practice into the future.
“Empowerment is about more than giving pharmacists permission to do more. It is about creating the conditions for them to contribute their knowledge, leadership and expertise – and ensuring the workforce is there to support them.
“Importantly, we already have many of the foundations needed to support a more sustainable hospital pharmacy workforce. AdPha’s Clinical Pharmacy Standards provide evidence-based guidance for safe staffing, while our Resident and Registrar Training Programs, Australian and New Zealand College of Advanced Pharmacy (ANZCAP) credentialling framework and Fellowship provide established pathways for workforce development, advanced practice and professional recognition.
“These frameworks give health services and governments practical foundations to build on. The opportunity now is to embed them into workforce planning and career structures so that pharmacists can develop, contribute and progress throughout their careers – and patients can benefit from the expertise of a sustainable, highly skilled workforce.”
Laura Triggs ANZCAP-Reg. (InfDis, Steward.), a recent graduate of AdPha’s Registrar Training program at a Canberra hospital site, said such programs help carve a pathway forward for junior pharmacists seeking specialisation.
“The AdPha Registrar Training program provided me with a valuable structure and pathway to develop expertise in a particular specialty. It gave me a clear framework for understanding what I needed to know and the skills I needed to develop to pursue that area of practice.
“For sites like Canberra, where access to specialised pharmacists can be more limited, the program opened doors to expertise beyond my immediate workplace. I was able to have a specialised pharmacist from Sydney as a mentor, while also engaging our Director of Infectious Diseases, in the program. Having that combination of specialised pharmacy mentoring and high-level infectious diseases expertise, included in our weekly catch-ups, provided me with an incredibly rich learning experience and helped bring my pathway to specialisation in Infectious Diseases to life.”
Assoc. Prof. Simpson said Australia’s health system must ensure pharmacists were empowered to make their full contribution.
“This World Pharmacists Day, while we celebrate what pharmacists contribute every day, we should also look at what they need to keep doing that work into the future.
“Empowering pharmacists means investing in their capability, their careers and the environments in which they practise. That investment ultimately strengthens the care Australians receive.”
