Learning in the places they’re needed most

Fourth-year pharmacy student Joel Ray says a rural  placement in Redcliff, Alta., showed him the  meaningful role pharmacists can play in patient's lives.

When pharmacy student Joel Ray arrived in Redcliff, Alta., for an eight-week placement, he expected to strengthen his clinical skills. What he didn’t expect was how quickly he would become part of a patient’s health-care journey.

One patient came to the pharmacy struggling with side-effects from a blood pressure medication. Over the following weeks, Ray helped assess the problem, worked with his supervising pharmacist to adjust treatment and monitored the patient’s progress.

“They were asking for me specifically by name,” says Ray, a fourth-year student in the University of Alberta’s Faculty of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences. “They felt that I was the one providing them care.”

Experiences like these are what the Neighbourly Pharmacy Placement Award is designed to support. Funded by Neighbourly Pharmacy, the award helps U of A pharmacy students pursue rural placements by offsetting costs such as housing, travel and relocation. For students, it creates opportunities for hands-on learning. For communities, it helps introduce future pharmacists to the rewards of practising in smaller centres across Alberta.

Ray grew up on a farm near Innisfail and has long been drawn to rural practice. But when it came time to choose a placement location, the realities of spending eight weeks in southern Alberta gave him pause.

“I probably wouldn’t have looked into that site,” he says. “I would have looked at something closer.”

The award changed that calculation.

“It was knocking down the one barrier that was existing,” says Ray. “I thought, ‘Now that that’s out of the way, what’s holding me back from going to Redcliff?’”

For Pete Dean, ’10 BSc(Pharm), vice-president of operations for Western Canada at Neighbourly Pharmacy, helping students access those experiences is an investment in both the profession and the communities Neighbourly serves.

About 70 per cent of Neighbourly’s pharmacies are located in rural and remote communities, where pharmacists are often one of the most accessible health-care providers.

“A lot of times when students are given the opportunity to be exposed to the incredible level of care that can be provided in these underserved communities, it impacts them quite a bit,” says Dean. “We feel it’s very important to give students that chance to be exposed to how meaningful care can be in those areas."

Those placements expose students to a side of pharmacy practice that can’t be replicated in a classroom

“In the skills lab, every question is answered for you,” says Ray. “When you get out into the real world, you have to navigate the scenarios that aren’t tied up nice and tidy.”

Award recipient Matthew Williams says his placement in Olds, Alta., highlighted the close relationships that define pharmacy practice in many smaller communities.

Fellow award recipient Matthew Williams saw those relationships first-hand during his placement in Olds, Alta.

“The pharmacy staff knew all of their patients and knew everybody’s conditions quite well,” says Williams. “It really helped my understanding of where I sit with patients.”

The award also helps remove practical barriers that can make rural placements difficult to consider. Temporary housing, travel and relocation expenses can quickly add up for students already managing the cost of their education. For Williams, who completed placements in Whitehorse, Olds and Wetaskiwin, that support helped ease some of the financial pressure that comes with spending months on the road

“Knowing I’d have a little bit of extra financial support gave me peace of mind,” says Williams. “It let me focus on learning instead of worrying as much about the logistics.”

For Ray, the experience strengthened his desire to build a career in a smaller community — which is exactly the kind of impact Neighbourly hopes to achieve, says Dean.

“Students are incredibly important to the organization,” he says. “They’re the future of our profession.”

And thanks to support that opened the door to a new opportunity, Ray was able to discover that future not in a classroom, but in a community.