Former Pharmacy Board of Tasmania president and national delegate Graeme Holloway received the Tasmanian Pharmacist Lifetime Achievement Award at the fifth annual Tasmanian Pharmacist Dinner last weekend (October 20).
Pharmaceutical Society of Australia (PSA) National President Dr Shane Jackson presented the award to Mr Holloway during the event at the Henry Jones Art Hotel on the Hobart waterfront.
Statewide Hospital Pharmacy Executive Director Tom Simpson was named Pharmacist of the Year, while Emma Shepperd from Triabunna, north of Hobart, won the Early Career Pharmacist Award.
The event was a collaboration between PSA, the Pharmacy Guild, the Society of Hospital Pharmacists of Australia (SHPA) and the University of Tasmania Pharmacy Department.
Dr Jackson, congratulating Mr Holloway, says his dedication to pharmacy had helped raise the standards of the profession and pharmacy organisations.
“Graeme was a fantastic mentor, not only to his own staff but to the hospital pharmacy interns he trained in his own time,” Dr Jackson said. “He was also recognised earlier this year when he was awarded PSA Life Fellow status at the PSA18 national conference in Sydney.”
Mr Holloway was responsible for redrafting the Tasmanian Pharmacy Act.
SHPA National President Professor Michael Dooley, presenting the Pharmacist of the Year Award to Mr Simpson, said: “Tom has applied his broad skillset, creativity and patient focus in a variety of roles, including establishing Tasmania’s digital medical record system.
“In pharmacy he has shown passionate commitment to improving medication safety across Tasmania’s health system, including establishing rural pharmacy services to ensure patients in rural hospitals receive the same level of pharmacy care they would in acute hospitals.”
Guild National President George Tambassis presented Ms Shepperd with her Early Career Pharmacist Award.
“Emma has successfully developed professional services, health promotions and community programs in the small town of Triabunna on the east coast, attracting national news coverage,” Mr Tambassis said. “She is the embodiment of a caring community pharmacist making a difference.”
Pharmacist Greg Kay won the Guild Distinguished Service Award and Harvey Cuthill received PSA Life Membership.
