With the proper preliminary requirements established, and without entering at this time into a discussion of the question as to the number of hours required for the work that should be done, believing as I do that the colleges and schools belonging to the Conference of Teaching Faculties will be able to decide this problem, I may say that no discussion of the educational problem is complete at this time without reference to the nature of the examinations of the Boards of Pharmacy. In years gone by these examinations have been largely theoretical, and hence were not so valuable as they might have been in testing the fitness of a candidate. Happily, there is beginning to be an improvement in this direction and the examinations are becoming more practical. To my way of thinking the aim of the boards of pharmacy should be to determine what a candidate can do. The theory has been given to him in college, and the final test should be to determine whether he has a working knowledge of the materials which he handles. Instead of asking him what are the elementary forms of matter, or what is a water-bath, or to give the family name of a plant yielding a drug, it would be better to give him some drug or chemical to identify, to carry out the tests for purity according to the Pharmacopœia and to make a preparation.
The boards of pharmacy have a very important work to perform in determining the fitness of candidates and in determining whether the colleges are faithfully carrying on their work. As matters are now constituted they are the final arbiters and should be fully cognizant of the great trust which they hold. It should no longer be possible for the unqualified or incompetent to enter college, spend two or three years at college and be given a degree and finally pass a State Board as a registered pharmacist.
THE DUTY OF PHARMACISTS.
Pharmacists themselves also have a very important part to perform in raising pharmacy to the plane that it must occupy to maintain its separate existence. In the first place they should not admit into apprenticeship young men who are deficient in preliminary education, for quite naturally they hope sooner or later to enter the schools of pharmacy. Indeed to admit such as these into apprenticeship is not only an injustice to them but also to the colleges of pharmacy, and this may be considered as one of the fundamental tests as to whether the pharmacist has the true interests of his calling at heart. Pharmacists can at this point be of real service to these young men by encouraging them and advising them to continue their education in the public schools or to acquire it in some other way.
The second duty of the pharmacist is to endeavor to conduct his business in such a manner that the educated young men will be attracted to it (for undoubtedly there is no more interesting work than that connected with the profession of pharmacy), and find something to repay them for their pains, and to appeal to their aspirations as professional men.
The third duty of the pharmacist is to the physician. If the physician is willing to rely upon the pharmacist and to help him in maintaining and re-establishing the profession of pharmacy by prescribing only the preparations and medicines in the Pharmacopœia and National Formulary, and the new and non-official remedies approved by the Council on Pharmacy and Chemistry of the American Medical Association, then should the pharmacist aim to eliminate as rapidly as possible patent medicines, nostrums and sundry articles not used as medicines, or as aids to the sick, or even as toilet preparations, and prepare to give his undivided attention to his profession, which alone by training, education and experience he is qualified to conduct.
In briefly summing up my remarks I may say that I have endeavored to emphasize the essential principles which we must bear in mind.
(1) A good preliminary education is essential to an apprentice and student of pharmacy.
(2) The least that a college or school of pharmacy should do is to send forth graduates that are masters of every detail of the U. S. Pharmacopœia and the National Formulary.
(3) It is the duty of the Board of Pharmacy to determine what applicants for the certificate of Registered Pharmacist can do rather than what they are able to memorize.