IPSF Annual Report 2007-08 by International Pharmaceutical Students' Federation

Table of Contents Acting President's message

IPSF Executive Committee 2007-08 rd IPSF Congress 53rd

Pharmacy Education

Professional Development Public Health

Student Exchange Programme Publications

IPSF Promotion

Development Fund Regional Offices

Allied Organisations

Acknowledgements

15 Cover design by Tendy Rusdiana

Table of Contents

IPSF was founded in London in 1949 with eight member countries. The Federation has grown to represent over 350,000 students and young pharmacists from 71 countries worldwide. IPSF is a non-profit, non-political and nonreligious volunteer organisation. It is the leading international advocacy organisation for pharmacy students, promoting improved public health through provision of information, education, networking and a range of publications and professional initiatives. The Federation has its secretariat located with the International Pharmaceutical Federation (FIP) in The Hague, The Netherlands. IPSF holds Official Relations with the World Health Organization (WHO), Operational Relations with the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) and Roster Consultative Status of the Economic and Social Council of the United Nations (UN ECOSOC). IPSF represents pharmacy students from:

Armenia, Bulgaria

Estonia Haiti Iran Japan

Austria Canada Democratic Republic of Congo Finland Hungary Ireland Jordan

Latvia Malta Norway Romania Singapore Sudan

Lithuania Morocco Peru Rwanda Slovakia Sweden

Macedonia FYR Mozambique Poland Russia Slovenia Switzerland

Malawi Nepal Portugal Serbia South Africa Taiwan, China

Malaysia Nigeria Republic of Korea Sierra Leone Spain Tanzania

Thailand The United States of America

The Netherlands

Tunisia

Turkey

United Kingdom

Vietnam

Zimbabwe

Czech Republic

Australia China

Bangladesh Costa Rica

Brazil Croatia

Denmark

Ecuador

Egypt

France Iceland Israel Kenya

Germany India Italy Kosovo UNMIK

Ghana Indonesia Jamaica Kuwait

Acting President’s Message

IPSF is proud to maintain our Roster Consultative Status by the Economic and Social Council of the United Nations (UN ECOSOC), Official Relations with the World Health Organization (WHO) and Operational Relations with the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), and the Executive have worked hard this year to build stronger relations with these partnerships as well developing our collaborative projects such as the Anti-counterfeit and sub-standard medicines campaign and tobacco awareness campaign. WHO internships for pharmacy students continue to be a feature during the year, with places available with various departments such as the Stop TB Partnership and the Department of Medicines Policy and Standards. Our collaboration continues to develop with our partner organisations the International Pharmaceutical Federation (FIP), the Commonwealth Pharmacists Association (CPA), the European Pharmaceutical Students' Association (EPSA) and the International Federation of Medical Students' Associations (IFMSA). This year has seen the take off of the P-squared project, which stemmed from the IPSF-IFMSA Memorandum of Understanding and looks to evaluate the needs of

nd pharmacy-medical collaboration. The 2nd World Healthcare Students' Symposium (WHSS) held in Portugal in November 2007 was organised by pharmacy, medical rd and nursing students, and was a great success. The 3rd WHSS 2009 will be held in Egypt, with organisations now underway.

IPSF has officially launched its first capacity building programme for pharmacy students, Leaders in Training th (LIT), with the first workshops being held at the 7th Asia Pacific Pharmaceutical Symposium (APPS) in Khon Kaen, Thailand. The Patient Counselling Event (PCE), which has been tradition at world congress, has also been introduced to APPS as well as the Pan-American Regional Symposium (PARS). Numerous initiatives endorsed by IPSF have been implemented by IPSF member associations worldwide. These initiatives include the IPSF Student Exchange Programme (SEP) which saw more than 500 students exchanged in 2007-08 and public health campaigns, activities to promote and develop the pharmacy profession. In addition, the Moving On III Migration Intentions of Pharmacy Students was launched in May, with preliminary discussion for Moving On IV will be th IPSF Congress in Cluj-Napoca, discussed at the 54th Romania August 2008. It is with great pleasure that the Executive Committee presents this annual report to you, sharing the dedication and successes in the Federation for the year 2007-08. Mary Poon Acting President 2008

IPSF Executive Committee 2007-08 Mary Poon, Australia Acting President 2008 Secretary-General 2007-09

Juha Mönkäre, Finland Treasurer

Mary attended her first IPSF event in Tokyo for the 4th Asia Pacific Pharmaceutical Symposium and has participated in IPSF Congress in Cairns 2006 and Taipei 2007. She worked as Asia Pacific Regional Office (APRO) Secretary in 2006-07 and graduated from Monash University with a Bachelor of Pharmacy a few months after her election as Secretary-General. She has put in her best efforts to balance Secretary-General tasks as well as the President portfolio such as development of new initiatives.

Juha has finished his third year as IPSF Treasurer, the position he has served since 2005. Before working in IPSF Executive Juha has been the Treasurer and the IPSF Contact Person in Finnish Pharmaceutical Students' Association (FiPSA). Juha graduated in March 2008 and is continuing his PhD studies in drug delivery at the University of Kuopio, Finland. He has taken care of the financial administration of IPSF in an exemplary manner and also fervently contributed to other portfolios.

Acting President’s Message

th In the 59th year of IPSF history, more than 350,000 pharmacy students and recent graduates from 82 associations from 71 countries represented in the Federation, it has been an exciting year for the Federation as it experiences new growth, development and opportunities. The year of 2007-08 has been marked with many challenges and developments and the Executive are proud to share the work and developments with our members and partner organisation in the Annual Report for 2007-08.

IPSF Executive Committee 2007-08

IPSF Executive Commitee 2007-08

Neveen Abdelghani, USA

Suresh Panthee, Nepal

Chairperson of Public Relations

Chairperson of Pharmacy Education

Neveen attended her first IPSF World Congress in Bonn, Germany in 2005. She was a workshop presenter and rd member of the Motions Committee at both the 53rd th World Congress in Cairns and the 54th World Congress in Taipei. Nationally, Neveen served as the SEO-elect (2004-05) and SEO (2005-06) for APhA-ASP. She graduated from the University Of Southern California School Of Pharmacy in May 2006 with her Doctor of Pharmacy and Master of Science degrees. She is currently completing the second year of a 2-year fellowship training program in infectious disease and clinical trials research in HIV/AIDS at Children's Hospital, Los Angeles, California.

Suresh had his first involvement with IPSF when he was CP and SEO to Nepal during the year 2003-04. He was one of the founding members of Nepal Pharmacy Students' Society (NPSS) and served as the secretary of the second st Congress in executive committee. He had attended 51st th APPS in Kathmandu. He is also one of the Bonn and 6th three representatives of IPSF for the IPSF-IFMSA Psquared project. He has been long involved with the interdisciplinary activities. He is expecting to graduate in August 2008 with an Mpharm.

John Nguyen, Australia

Tendy Rusdiana, Indonesia

Chairperson of Professional Development

Chairperson of Publications

John has been involved with IPSF since 2005 where he has loved every moment of IPSF experiences. He first st Congress Bonn Germany 2005, then tasted IPSF at 51st th APPS Tokyo Japan shortly after went for elections at 4th as Secretary of APRO in 2005-06, then Chairperson of APRO 2006-07, then as Training Coordinator 2007 till his current position on executive. He has attended three IPSF World Congresses and four APPS and hopes to see IPSF move from strength to strength in years to come.

Tendy has finished his year as IPSF Chairperson of th Publication. He has been involved in IPSF since the 5th APPS in Bandung as part of the Reception Committee and continued in the APRO publications subcommittee and was responsible for designing and maintaining the APRO website. Tendy is graduated with Bachelor of Pharmacy from Institut Teknologi Bandung in July 2008. He has put his best to make IPSF Publications more attractive and exciting look with new and fresh design.

Veronika Šumpichóva, Czech Republic

Nene Patcharawadee Burarungroj, Thailand

Chairperson of Student Exchange

Chairperson of IPSF Asia Pacific Regional Office

Veronika is currently graduating from masters deegree of pharmacy at Faculty of Pharmacy, Charles University in Prague, Czech Republic. Her first experience with IPSF was three years ago at the IPSF Annual congress in Germany. She became very enthusiastic about IPSF, so she did her best as Czech Student Exchange Officer then followed as Student Exchange Committee and contributed greatly as IPSF Chairperson of Student Exchange. She has created new SEP database as well as focused on promotion, translation of the materials and further development of SEP all around the globe!

Nene had participated in IPSF international congress for th Asia Pacific Pharmaceutical the first time at the 4th Symposium (APPS) Tokyo 2005, and was elected as APRO Regional Relation Officer for 2005-06 and 2006-07. At the th APPS Kathmandu 2007, she was elected as 6th Chairperson of the Asia Pacific Regional Office. She is currently enrolled as fourth year student at the Pharmaceutical Science Faculty of Khon Kaen University, Thailand and will be graduating in December 2008.

IPSF Executive Committee 2007-08 Shawna Cordon, USA Chairperson of IPSF Pan American Regional Office

Shawna attended her first World Congress in Cairns th Pan American 2006. She went on to participate in the 6th Regional Symposium in Costa Rica 2007 where she started her term as Chairperson of the Pan-American Regional Office. Shawna has been active with IPSF in her local association and she is currently in her final year at the University of Kansas Medical Centre.

Anca Pop, Romania Chairperson of 54th IPSF Congress Reception Committee

Anca is a 24 years old pharmacy student from Cluj Napoca, Romania. She is currently in her final year of studies and, if everything goes conforming to plan, she will graduate in September and start her PhD. research in toxicology. In Cairns, Australia (2006) on behalf of FASFR th Romania she successfully bit for organizing the 54th IPSF Congress in Romania. Since then, together with the whole Reception Committee, she is working to provide you the IPSF congress everybody wishes for

53rd IPSF Congress, Taipei, Taiwan, China After one full year of anticipation, the old and the new rd friends finally united together at the 53rd IPSF Congress held in Taipei, from 6-15 August. And what happens when you put 320 pharmacy students from more than 40 countries together in a luxurious hotel? The birth of lifelong friendships and unforgettable memories! The congress offered participants with combinations of programs that covered educational and professional aspects, including the General Assembly sessions, meetings of official delegates and subcommittees, public health and educational workshops, Scientific Symposium and Educational Forum. It also provided a stage for students to perform their skills and knowledge through events such as Patient Counselling Event and Poster Exhibition. The topics of Scientific Symposium and Educational Forum were “Financing in Health Care” and “Pharmacoeconomics”, respectively. Highly recognised international and local guest speakers presented on the topics at National Defence Medical University. At night, the participants enjoyed themselves in the social events

designed by the reception committee. Social events such as Red Festival, night clubbing, Hello-Gwee, along with the usual IPSF features such as the Development Fund Auction and International Night marked the end of another busy yet fruitful day. With every participants looking glamorous in their elegant dresses, the congress ended with a luxurious gala night at the top floor of the Grand Hotel. The Post Congress Tour (PCT) took off with some concern of an approaching typhoon. Unfortunately, the weather was under bad conditions but fortunately, it did not cool down the high spirits of the group. From Taipei to the east, south, and west of the country, the PCT participants were able to experience the unique culture and the beauty the island had to offer. The participants went back home with not only enriched knowledge, passion and enthusiasm, but also the fond memory of happy times with new and old friends during rd the 53rd IPSF Congress Taipei.

53rd IPSF Congress, Taipei, Taiwan, China

Pharmacy Education Moving On Research Moving On is IPSF's series of original questionnairebased research projects and it continued to be a cornerstone initiative of the Federation. It has until now consisted of three different projects: finalised Moving On I on Academic Mobility, ongoing Moving On II on Pharmacy curricula and the Student Learning Experience, and ongoing Moving On III on Emerging Pharmacists and Their Intention to Migrate. The theme and topic for Moving on IV is undergoing discussion and will be finalised in 2008-09 following the workshop at th IPSF Congress in Romania organised in August 54th 2008.

Pharmacy Education

A policy making paper was presented by IPSF, School of Pharmacy and United Nations Educational, Scientific and nd Cultural Organization (UNESCO) at the 52nd conference of the Comparative and International Education Society (CEIS) in New York City, USA. The paper focused on quality assurance and educational equity and was based on the findings of the Moving on II research. At this stage, the database contains about 10,000 responses from thirty countries and the questionnaire has been translated to eight different languages. The survey tool for Moving on III has been revised and finalized. The final questionnaire is out and the participating countries are in the process of data collection. New countries have been added to the research and the research now involves 26 countries. MOIII preliminary data was presented at Indian Pharmaceutical Congress at Varanasi in December 2007. Possible topics for Moving on IV have been in discussion, with “Professionalism” and “Continuous Professional Development” being probable themes.

Phuture This year, Phuture has been prepared with the theme of “Antibiotic resistance”. Antibiotic resistance is a major problem of present therapy and action is to be taken to tackle with this problem. The causes of antibiotic resistance are obvious and not unknown to health care professionals but lack of planning and devotion towards this problem is the cause of increase in the problem during this period. Many things can be done from the position where we are: whether as a policy-maker or health care professional or health advocate or member of the public, to overcome the upsurge of growth of resistant strains. The issue contains articles by expertise in the field of microbiology, antibiotics research and students. IPSF would like to thank the authors for their contribution. th 54th IPSF Congress

The themes for scientific symposium and educational th IPSF world congress are “Quality of symposium at 54th

Phuture Issue No. 15 July 2008 Theme: Antibiotic Resistance

Pharmaceuticals - Idealism versus Reality” and “New Challenges in Pharmacy Profession” respectively. Through these sessions, students will be able to differentiate between the ideal image and ground scenario in the field of pharmaceuticals and understand about the role of pharmacy education in meeting the new challenges.

FIP World Congress Over 2007-08, IPSF has continued to work closely with th FIP. At the 67th FIP World Congress in Beijing, China, September 2007, IPSF organised the annual FIP-IPSF Students' Day on Social Dimensions of Developing the Pharmacy Profession, in addition to organising joint sessions on Experiential Learning and Medication Reviews. IPSF also co-hosted a Forum for Policy makers with the Community Pharmacy Section and the FIP Young Pharmacists Group. th FIP Congress Basel, In September 2008, at the 68th Switzerland IPSF organises the annual FIP-IPSF Students' Day, on Advocating for Pharmacy. This year, IPSF will also be co-hosting a Forum for Policy makers with the Community Pharmacy Section on Trends in community pharmacy debating the future of the profession, Administrative Pharmacy Section and the Young Pharmacists Group. IPSF will also be holding joint sessions with the Hospital Pharmacy Section on From Dreams to Reality and Beyond, and the Pharmacy Information Section focusing on Medication Review Collaboration between pharmacists, physicians and patients. th FIP World Congress in Istanbul, Turkey, IPSF For the 69th has been developing the FIP-IPSF Students' Day theme, propose to be the Public Health Role for Pharmacists. This session will help maximise the contribution of pharmacists, pharmacy students and other stakeholders in helping people enjoy healthier lives by giving them access to more information about their health care. Focus should be made on the roles pharmacists can play and their importance in public health and the ways to improve public health.

Professional Development Patient Counselling Event

This past year has seen an evolutionary and breaking new boundaries in regards to training programme for IPSF. It was previously known as “TNT” Training New Trainers which was modelled off partners from International Federation of Medical Student Associations (IFMSA) back in 2006 and had a different focus to spread training message from participants of TNT and bring back the programme to their local or national clubs. The training session topics were highly varied and not standardised with varying quality of results and feedback.

Patient Counselling Event (PCE) has also risen to new heights this year with PCE being introduced to IPSF regional symposia. The aim of PCE is to enhance student's awareness of the communication skills necessary to be good practising pharmacists and making sure that their qualified tertiary clinical skills are used optimally in conversation with the patient.

LIT has an all-new focus to be used as a form of succession planning for the future student leaders at both local and national clubs and eventually coming through IPSF ranks. It aims to standardise the “Top 5” training topics which will be used consistently from programme to programme whether it be different IPSF events or local or national training sessions. It helps strengthen future candidates intending to run for elections and be more ready prepared for IPSF leadership and responsibility as well as incorporating a “Successful Training” topic to allow students to bring it back to their home organisation. LIT topics include: Personal Development, Project Management, Succession Planning and Group Dynamics, Communication and Public Speaking, and Successful Training. The sessions are designed to be both applicable to real-student based organisations as well as have practical group games and activities to drive core concepts home. th LIT events were organised successfully at 7th Asia-Pacific Pharmaceutical Symposium, Thailand in June 2008 and 54th IPSF Congress, Romania in July 2008 with all participants appreciating the values learnt over the 3 day programme.

First batch of LITs at 7

APPS Thailand

Group activities at LIT

IPSF has organised PCE for a long time, and for the first time it was organised in 1989. PCE booklet (available for download www.ipsf.org) was introduced in collaboration with FIP-IPSF in 2005 to bring more resources to organise these events. IPSF World Congress programme includes annually PCE. There is a PCE workshop to introduce the concept of counselling, tips and technique for students. This followed by preliminary rounds where all delegates are invited to practice one-to-one with an actor patient and being judged by experienced pharmacists to provide constructive feedback to help improve their skills. This past year, IPSF has gone a step further by introducing PCE to the regional offices including Asia-Pacific and PanAmerican regions. The first-ever PCE at Asia-Pacific th Pharmaceutical Symposium (APPS) was held recently at 7th APPS Thailand and run very successfully with a PCE information workshop for all participants to attend, and then the next day a PCE finals that show-cased three brave volunteer students to perform on stage in front of all APPS delegates to inspire others with their communication skills.

Pharmacy Profession Awareness Campaign This project is designed to promote the profession and roles of pharmacists to prospective high school students, current students looking for career paths, and the wider general public. It is an important project to ensure that everyone in society understands and is aware of what services and clinical knowledge a pharmacist can provide, and allow pharmacists to be better utilised as health care professionals both in allied and primary health care. This project is an abstract concept, as campaigns are run around the world with varying focuses and themes to promote the pharmacy profession. I would like to acknowledge countries including Australia, Canada, Nepal, Poland and Singapore for actively submitting their reports regularly to IPSF and having them placed in IPSF

First ever PCE competition at 7

APPS Thailand

Professional Development

Leaders-In-Training (LIT)

John Nguyen giving introduction to PCE

Newsletters and website. Some of these activities include visiting high schools, medication review services at nursing homes, proactive week-long campaigns to the general public in shopping centres and even collaborative campaigns with medical students. Other campaigns with public health initiatives are also run at every Asia-Pacific th Pharmaceutical Symposium (APPS) for example 6th APPS Nepal 2007 was general public campaign, gathering attention of huge crowds in streets of Kathmandu promoting awareness of HIV/AIDS and participants as pharmacy students letting the public know that pharmacists can also play a role with health care.

Public Health IPSF and WHO

Public Health

IPSF continued to maintain its status as a nongovernmental organisation (NGO) in Official Relations with the World Health Organization (WHO) that it has had since 2004. The collaboration with WHO and its departments is the key role in IPSF work within public health. IPSF distributes information on the current public health topics and recent WHO news through its publications such as News Bulletin or electronic newsletter. IPSF participated in the 61st World Health Assembly (WHA) in May 2008 and this occasion is also important for IPSF work with WHO. IPSF has continued offering opportunities for IPSF Members to undertake internships in the WHO Headquarters in Geneva. In 2007-08, IPSF members were able to apply for internships in the WHO Department of Chronic Diseases and Health Promotion in the field of health promotion and also in the StopTB Partnership Secretariat. IPSF is also working on with some other WHO departments to have additional internships in the future. As a partner organisation of the WHO-NGO Advisory Group on Health Promotion, IPSF actively participated in st WHA. Advisory Group's planning meeting at the 61st The aim of the meeting was the preparation of Health promotion congress in Nairobi, Kenya in 2009 together with other health-related NGOs. IPSF is also participating for this preparation. In addition to the collaboration with WHO, IPSF encourages its members to work with national and local organisations working on the field of public health. This collaboration helps to promote pharmacy students' and

Counterfeit medicines workshop at the 53

IPSF Congress

WHO meeting in Geneva, Switzerland

pharmacists' role in the public health. Local collaboration can often also take into account better local conditions and challenges for public health. Counterfeit and Substandard Medicines IPSF has launched an initiative against counterfeit and substandard medicines together with WHO and IMPACT (International Medical Products Anti-Counterfeiting Taskforce). IMPACT consists of many stakeholders related to counterfeit medicines such as WHO, the International Pharmaceutical Federation (FIP), the International Federation of Pharmaceutical Manufacturers' Association (IFPMA) and regulatory bodies. The main goal is to provide healthcare students, the future healthcare professionals, with sufficient awareness and knowledge required to effectively combat counterfeit medicines at the grassroots level in the future. The project will focus on providing students with information on the threats of counterfeit and substandard medicines to worldwide public health, and hence get them committed in the combat against these products. The initiative was initially rd launched at the 53rd IPSF World Congress in August 2007

HIV/AIDS Campaign in Indonesia

TB Campaign in Nepal

Public Health Days: Diabetes, HIV/AIDS, TB, Tobacco IPSF Healthy Living and Diabetes campaign is the newest of the four IPSF public health campaigns and it was launched in 2005. Each year a special highlight for this th November - World Diabetes campaign is given on 14th Day. “Diabetes in Children and Adolescents” was the theme for this day in 2007. IPSF members were encouraged to promote awareness of diabetes and healthy lifestyle among their peers and to the general public. Activities were held in countries such as Jordan, Singapore and Nepal. In addition, it was also compiled and published a special thematic Diabetes issue of IPSF Newsletter.

Diabetes Campaign in Nepal

1st December marked World AIDS day and its global theme in 2007 was “Stop AIDS. Keep the Promise.” Besides raising HIV/AIDS awareness as a disease, IPSF AIDS Awareness campaign focuses also on issues relating Human Rights in HIV/AIDS. This is supported by United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). It was published a thematic HIV/AIDS issue of IPSF Newsletter to promote condition to all IPSF Members. Campaign materials provided by UNAIDS and UNESCO were distributed to members who conducted campaigns. Nepal, Canada, Spain, Jordan, Malawi, Finland and Indonesia had HIV/AIDS campaigns

along the year. Themes and methods of campaigns ranged from educating hairdressers about hygiene to organising lectures and parties for students and faculty staff. th March was themed “I am stopping World TB Day on 24th TB” and it was campaigned by many IPSF members. Indian pharmacy students had major street TB awareness campaigns on across several Indian cities. The campaign consisted of talk on TB, informative play, distribution of campaign materials, and even preliminary detection of TB cases. This was the first time Indian pharmacy students had this kind of community health activity, and it also gained global attention of pharmacists through the newsletter of International Pharmaceutical Federation (FIP). Slovenia, Nepal, Indonesia, Kenya and Finland also had their TB campaigns. “Tobacco-Free Youth” was the theme of World No Tobacco st Day on 31st May 2008. IPSF took its first step to do campaigning in the social websites and a Facebook group was established to support campaigning. It was a promising start and likely this approach will be used as an

Public Health

and after that the working group was formed. Working group members are from different parts of world, from developed, transitional and developing countries. Materials will include a website, CD-ROM distributed to students with limited internet-access, presentation slides and posters. First set of materials is expected to be ready by the end of year 2008 and all English material will be published in May 2009. Main parts of material will be translated also into Spanish and French.

Diabetes Campaign in Jordan

information sharing channel in the future. IPSF Tobacco Alert Campaign was conducted in Rwanda and Democratic Republic of Congo. Pharmacy students from the very recent IPSF member country Democratic Republic of Congo shared information on harms of smoking by distributing leaflets and using airtime in the radio station called “Pharmacy and Society”. Following the launch of a Joint Statement on Tobacco Control by the WHO Tobacco Free Initiative and IPSF in 2007, the Federation is in the process of creating the system to classify and quantify IPSF Members anti-tobacco efforts. th

On World Health Day, on 7th April 2008, IPSF members were encouraged to adapt the theme of “Protecting health from climate change” and IPSF Members were informed about this in the IPSF Newsletter. Climate change affects also pharmacists in a numerous ways as it can bring new diseases to new areas or increase the number of natural disasters. This can have affects for example clinical work or give new demands for drug distribution in emergency situations. IPSF Members did activities related to this day in Egypt, Kenya and Indonesia.

Student Exchange Programme The IPSF Student Exchange Programme (SEP) has had a long history with the Federation. Ever since 1958, it has allowed undergraduate students from IPSF member organisations and IPSF Individual Members to explore pharmacy in other countries. IPSF has currently 71 member organisations throughout the world participating in SEP and over 500 international exchanges take place every year. The SEP is based on the network of Student Exchange Officers who take care of exchanges in all participating IPSF member organisations.

Student Exchange Programme

Mobility is an important aspect of the pharmacy curricula as it prepares pharmacy students to work as health professionals in the dynamic global healthcare environment. Through the Student Exchange Programme, IPSF works to increase opportunities for improvement in pharmacy education by facilitating students to undertake international professional experiences in these particular fields of pharmacy:

 Community pharmacy  Hospital pharmacy  Academic pharmaceutical research  Administrative pharmacy  Industrial fields of pharmacy The aim of SEP is to promote understanding and cooperation amongst pharmacy students and all health care professionals. The exchange programme offers the unique educational and cultural experience in addition to the regular pharmaceutical knowledge. It also helps to broaden the students' understanding of pharmaceutical and social conditions in different countries. This year, we have welcomed these new associations in IPSF SEP: Country name

The programme runs throughout whole year, however most exchanges take place between May and September, and the length of exchanges varies between one and three months. Room and board are usually provided by the host; some countries also provide a small amount of pocket money. Travel expenses and insurance are the responsibilities of the student. SEP is also helping students with limited financial capacity The IPSF Development Fund SEP Grant is available to provide financial help to cover partially exchange students' travel costs, especially of those coming from developing countries. In 2008, the amount of 1000 Euro was distributed for this purpose. All exchanges are handled through the internet database, and in 2008 the new version of SEP database was developed. It will be launched in August, 2008. There are obvious reasons for changing from old version into new version such as: the higher number of organisations involved with the increased number of pharmacy students in SEP, the database's professional technical background and many improved new features to help communication flow amongst Student Exchange Officers, students and the Chairperson of Student Exchange Programme. New SEP promotional materials were created in order to promote SEP to new countries and students who would like to have an international exchange. These materials are all now easily accessible for download and printing for everyone. Thus, IPSF certainly hopes that even more students would participate in SEP next year. The aim and the purpose of the SEP is to serve pharmacy students and pharmacy professionals as a platform for the exchange and communication of international experiences and ideas!

Association name

Bangladesh Congo Dem. rep.

BPSA CEPS

Iceland Indonesia

FLHI BEMF-SDU

Indonesia Indonesia

GMU HMD-FU

Indonesia

ISMAFARSI

Jordan Kenya

JPSA NUPSA

Malawi Nepal

COMPSA PUSPA

South Africa

SAPSF

South Korea, Dem. rep. Zimbabwe

KNAPS ZPSA

SEP Participants in Egypt

New SEP Leaflet

SEP Participant (right) in Indian pharmacy

Publications IPSF News Bulletin

IPSF Website

The IPSF News Bulletin our main bulletin consist more than 30 articles which covers nine main sections: the Executive, news and views, public relations, public health, education pharmacy, professional development, student exchange, reports, congresses, regional office, and allied organisations. By incorporating reports of members activities into all parts if the News Bulletin we have been able to include more information regarding members have been done, and to highlight the different fields in which IPSF is active world wide. The News and Views section of News Bulletin was translated into other official languages of the federation; Spanish, French, and Arabic, to ensure the equal understanding of IPSF information to our members around the world.

The new IPSF website was created in 2007 and is aimed to keep members better informed as to the activities of the Federation and its members associations. This year we have made some changes to the IPSF website including the restructuring the web pages so that it is more user friendly for our visitors. A banner editor feature also had been added to the IPSF website as a tool for sponsorship and advertisement purposes. This year we have also been trying to fix the new IPSF e-groups in the new web server.

The e-Newsletter is the most frequent IPSF publication and holds an important role in the communication in IPSF. This year there has been changes made to the enewsletter. The design of the IPSF e-Newsletter had been re-newed twice, the first one was using a blue colour scheme for the header of the newsletter, and was changed to green colour scheme according to the IPSF official colour. The new green colour scheme represents youth, freshness, and health. The changes of the design had been made to increase the appeal of the Newsletter andcreate a more enjoyable read for our members. From September 2007 to June 2008, IPSF has published 10 issues of the e-Newsletter. All of them cover the activities of IPSF including members' activities, public health days and the student exchange programme.

Throughout 2008, IPSF had been using the PHP Mailing List to spread information and updates to all members as well as on the IPSF website. It is an effective and efficient tool for IPSF to reach our members all around the world. In addition, this year we have also created a new design for promotional posters, leaflets, and PowerPoint presentation to make our promotional toolkit more catchy and appealing to our student audience to which we promote IPSF to. Through all these reforms we hope to keep members better informed to the activities of the Federation and its member associations as well as renewing IPSF with more enjoyable and fresh designs.

acdc International Pharmaceutical Studentsâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; Federation

anti-counterfeit drugs campaign

Presentation template

Poster and Bookmark Designs

logo designs

Publications

E- Newsletter

Mailing List

IPSF Promotion New Strategies for Membership Recruitment and Retention Pay Off IPSF promotion has two main aims: 1) to increase IPSF awareness among current members, particularly among students who are at the start of their pharmacy education and 2) to increase the IPSF presence in new countries and regions. These two goals above have continued to maintain IPSF's position as the leading international advocacy organization for pharmacy students and recent graduates across the globe. Each IPSF member organisation has an appointed Contact Person who serves as the vital and primary link between the IPSF Executive Committee and the member organisation. Contact Persons are responsible for the promotion of IPSF nationally and locally, as well as, for the distribution of IPSF publications and further dissemination of IPSF information to their constituents. .

Promotion | Development Fund

IPSF promotion to new countries is co-ordinated by the Chairperson of Public Relations. IPSF has five regions that include Pan-America, Europe, Africa, Eastern

Mediterranean and Asia-Pacific. This year saw the successful introduction of Regional Co-ordinators to a newly restructured Membership Promotion Committee, whose primary functions are to further assist the Chairperson with IPSF regional promotion, as well as, maintain contact with current IPSF members belonging to their respective regions In 2007, IPSF welcomed a record 13 new member organisations that represented eight new countries including Democratic Republic of the Congo, Jordan, Malawi, Malaysia, Morocco, Republic of Korea, Sierra Leone and Zimbabwe. Despite these great successes, three countries (Mexico, New Zealand and Panama) lost membership in IPSF. It is hoped that the new Regional Coordinator model for membership recruitment and retention will continue this year's successes and significantly stabilise and strengthen the IPSF global presence in years to come.

IPSF Development Fund Supporting Pharmacy Students to Participate in IPSF Activities The Development Fund (DF) was established in 1969, almost forty years ago. Ever since, the main goal of the fund has been to provide each and every pharmacy student with an equal opportunity to fully participate in IPSF activities. Originally this was achieved by financially helping members attend IPSF Congresses. However the remit of the fund has been extended over the years and today it can support students when they are taking part in the IPSF Student Exchange Programme, organising IPSF campaigns or in the payment of IPSF membership fees. When making decisions on DF grants being awarded, applicants originating from developing countries receive priority. The Development Fund is steered by the Development Fund Committee which is chaired by the Development Fund Co-ordinator. The main financial sources of the Development Fund are charity auctions held at the IPSF World Congress and the Regional Symposia. The concept of the auction is that congress participants donate unique and genuine items

from their home countries. Some items are even especially tailor-made for the auction. Other income sources include donations and congress profits. In general IPSF Congresses are non-profit events, however if any profit is generated, the congress host must donate a proportion of this profit to the Development Fund according to the IPSF Constitution. If you wish to donate money to help the work of the fund please contact the IPSF Treasurer. The Development Fund has supported participation of six pharmacy students at the World Healthcare Students' Symposium in Portugal, November 2007; one student at the Asia-Pacific Pharmaceutical Symposium (APPS) in Thailand, June 2008; and three students at the World Congress in Romania, August 2008. Awarded pharmacy students were from Bangladesh, Costa Rica, Egypt, Kenya, Nepal and South Africa. Two pharmacy students from both India and Poland were awarded DF Student Exchange Programme Grants.

Asia Pacific Regional Office The Asia-Pacific Regional Office (APRO) has another great year, 2007-08, working hard to represent and promote students' interests in pharmacy on local, national and international levels. th The 7th Asia-Pacific Pharmaceutical Symposium (APPS), hosted by he Pharmaceutical Students Union of Thailand (PSUT) from 27 June-6 July, was the main event in the Asia Pacific region and attracted 130 international and local students to the city of Khon Kaen, Thailand. The theme for the symposium was â&#x20AC;&#x153;The Pharmacy role in ration drug useâ&#x20AC;?. APPS comprised of the Regional Assembly, workshops, lectures and lots of social programs. The Patient Counselling Event (PCE) was also a main feature as it featured in APPS for the first time this year. Before the symposium, APRO organised the third consecutive training program, Leaders in Training (LIT), for future student leaders from local communities.

APRO has continued its five year strategic plan 20072011 bringing future direction and vision to IPSF-APRO objectives and activities for future Regional Working Groups.

This year, APRO welcomed three new Full members (ISMAFARSI Indonesia, KNAPS Korea and APS-Japan) and four new Members-in-Association (MyPSA Malaysia, PUSPA Nepal, BEMF Sanata Dharma, Indonesia and Student Association of Pharmacy Gadjah Mada University, rd Indonesia) at the 53rd IPSF congress Taipei, August 2007. The IPSF Student Exchange Programme (SEP) has been strengthening in APRO this year, with increasingly more students from Asia-Pacific taking part in the programme. APRO will be representing IPSF in professional organisations' meetings, such as the student session nd during the 22nd Federation Asian Pharmaceutical Associations (FAPA) Congress in Singapore, November 2008. APRO is also in the process of establishing relationships with external organisations such as FIP Western Pacific Pharmaceutical Forum (WPPF) and the FIP-WHO Forum of Pharmaceutical Associations for South East Asia (SEARPharm Forum). th APPS 2009; this will be hosted We look forward to the 8th by the Malaysian Pharmaceutical Students Association.

Regional Offices

APRO also continued the past regional working group's aim in collaboration with future healthcare professionals. APRO has collaborated with the International Federation of Medical Students Associations (IFMSA) to produce the first P-squared: Physician x Pharmacist questionnaire. It nd has been distributed to all delegates at the 2nd World Healthcare Students' Symposium, Portugal in November th 2007 and was also distributed at the 7th APPS.

Pan America Regional Office The year 2007-08 had many ups and downs. First of all, due to unavoidable circumstances, the 7th Annual PanAmerican Regional Symposium (PARS) has been th th-12th postponed until September 8th , 2008 and will take place in Cuernavaca, Mexico. A letter of apology has been distributed to the region and is also posted on the IPSF website. Juan Carlos Sanchez (AMEF, Mexico), the PARS Chairperson, has completed the new PARS 2008 programme, application for registration, and a detailed poster; all of which have also been uploaded to the IPSF website. Also, this will be the first year for PARS to host a Patient Counselling Event (PCE). The event will be held in both English and Spanish with the necessary translators. The PCE is a very important addition and the host for PARS 2009 will also be encouraged to include patient counselling to the PARS programme. One of the major accomplishments PARO achieved this year is finally distributing he first Annual Pan-American Regional Newsletter. The release date was set for July 2008 to allow for the new PARS information to be included. The newsletter will be available in both English and Spanish. The purpose of this year's newsletter is to promote involvement from more Pan-American

Countries in both PARS and IPSF. Next year, we hope to include articles from pharmacy schools of different countries in the region. The biggest challenge for the Pan-American region is membership and participation. It is needed need to get more countries involved with IPSF. One way would be to use the newsletter to advertise IPSF events and to describe how becoming a member is beneficial for each country. The 2008-09 Regional Working Group should also work on building a regional contact list by working with national embassies. With the help of these contacts, the Regional Working Group could help increase membership by organizing IPSF initiative events in different parts of the region to show how being a member could better healthcare and disease awareness.

Allied Organisations European Pharmaceutical Students' Association (EPSA) Representatives from IPSF participated in the two official European Pharmaceutical Students' Association th (EPSA) events, the 4th EPSA Autumn Assembly in th Istanbul, Turkey October 2007 and the 31st EPSA Annual Congress in Novi Sad, Serbia in April 2008.The IPSF-EPSA Memorandum of Understanding was renewed at the Autumn Assembly to facilitate further collaboration in the future.

International Federation of Medical Students' Associations (IFMSA)

Allied Organisations

IPSF has maintained good relations with the International Federation of Medical Students' Associations (IFMSA), with the Executive meeting the IFMSA Liaison Officer to Student Organisations (LOSO) in September 2007. IPSF was also represented in the IFMSA Training the Trainers workshops as well as the IFMSA March Meeting in Monterrey, Mexico. IPSF and IFMSA continue to work strongly together to develop the new P-Squared Project, which aims to study and encourage of the importance of collaboration between the medical and pharmacy professions.

collaboration of future healthcare professionals. The first symposium, known as WorldMAPS, was organised in November 2005. nd WHSS was held in Albufeira, Portugal in The 2nd November 2007 collecting around 300 healthcare students around the world. Symposium themes dealt with ethics in healthcare, interdisciplinary education and collaboration, and public health. The WHSS is planned by the working group that has members from all partner rd WHSS is going to be held in organisations. The 3rd Alexandria, Egypt in November 2009, and organisations are underway.

The organisations involved in WHSS are: IFMSA

International Federation of Medical Students' Associations IPSF International Pharmaceutical Students' Association ICN-SN International Council of Nurses Student Nurse Network EMSA European Medical Students' Association EPSA European Pharmaceutical Students' Association ENSA European Nursing Students' Association

World Healthcare Students Symposium (WHSS) IPSF is a partner organisation in the World Healthcare Students Symposium (WHSS), which is a bi-annual international symposium for healthcare students, organised by healthcare students. Currently, medical, pharmacy and nursing students are involved in the initiative that aims to enhance the multidisciplinary

Pharmacy and medical students with WHO representatives at the 2

Medical and pharmacy students at the international night of 2

WHSS

Portuguese, Kenyan, Taiwanese, and Greek students at at the 2

International feelings at the 2

WHSS

Commonwealth Pharmaceutical Association (CPA) International Pharmaceutical Federation (FIP) Pharmaceutical Press School of Pharmacy, University of London United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) World Health Organization (WHO)

Acknowlegments

Acknowledgements

International Pharmaceutical Students' Federation P.O. BOX 84200 2508 AE Den Haag The Netherlands Tel: +31 70 302 1992 Fax: +31 70 302 1999 E-mail: ipsf@ipsf.org Website: www.ipsf.org