Contractors are more likely to suffer from workplace pressures such as stress than employee pharmacists and locums, the C+D Salary Survey 2012 has found.

Seventy-five per cent of the 57 contractors who responded to the survey said they suffered from stress, while the same proportion complained of increased paperwork, the highest proportion of any role in community pharmacy. And 19 per cent admitted to drinking more than usual as a result of work, compared to 9 per cent of pharmacist branch managers and 17 per cent of superintendent pharmacists.

Contractor issues included increased workload, 100-hour pharmacies and GPs directing scripts to preferred pharmacies	More from the C+D Salary Survey 2012 Pharmacists make four dispensing errors a year Stress is ‘cancer in profession', PDA warns Rising number of employees say they lack support       for stress
	Issues that contributed to pressure at work included increased workload, 100-hour pharmacies opening nearby and local GP practices directing prescriptions to their preferred pharmacies, according to contractors.

Numark director of pharmacy services Mimi Lau said that work pressures were especially severe for independent contractors, who "tend to work longer hours than their counterparts working in managed chains".

"[Those] pharmacists will often receive more support from their head office, as well as have more opportunities to network with their co-workers," she told C+D.

Medicines counter assistants were the least troubled by stress, with 18 per cent reporting it as an issue. This contrasted with an average of 60 per cent across the sector.