European pharmacists should look to the UK as a "shining example" of how to maintain their professional status by offering innovative services, Pharmaceutical Group of the European Union (PGEU) general secretary John Chave has said.

Pharmacy in Europe risked "death by a thousand cuts" with the gradual erosion of the dispensing role through the use of robots and less-qualified dispensing staff, said Mr Chave at the annual meeting of the European Association of Pharmaceutical Full-line Wholesalers in Sofia, Bulgaria this week (June 3).

Mr Chave warned that this was undermining pharmacists' professional role and they needed to offer new services to patients if they wanted to maintain their position in society.

"Everybody realises that we have to change. The UK is a good example of actually managing to move forward" John Chave, PGEU	More on European pharmacy EU watchdog could force France into u-turn on       co-cyprindiol MHRA must end stalemate to avoid lagging behind       EU on counterfeits European importing rules could spark UK       medicines shortage MORE NEWS
	European policy makers who were interested in providing a range of state-funded pharmacy services, such as vaccinations and NMS, needed to visit the UK to see how it was done, he added.

"Everybody realises that we have to change. The UK is a good example of actually managing to move forward," he told C+D after his presentation.

Offering new services was not a "magic wand" to replace income lost from dispensing, but European pharmacists could use it as a way to supplement their income and expand their business, he said.

"I know [the UK system] is not without problems, but our message to UK pharmacists is that they should be extremely proud of what they've achieved. It's really a shining example in Europe," he added.

Implementing change in pharmacies was a "dirty, messy business" and independent pharmacists needed financial incentives to encourage them to move beyond the traditional dispensing model, Mr Chave said.

He gave the example of a diabetes screening service in the Côte d'Azur region of France that was only delivered by 2 per cent of pharmacists. He compared this with the uptake of pharmacy services in the UK, where he said more than half of pharmacists were providing innovative services.

The PGEU represents national associations and professional bodies of community pharmacists in 32 European countries, including the NPA, Royal Pharmaceutical Society and Pharmaceutical Society of Northern Ireland.