From drug discovery and pharmacovigilance to drug manufacturing and distribution, pharmacists play a vital role in the healthcare domain. A qualified pharmacy professional is the one who ensures medicines are safe, efficient, cost-effective and appropriate for patient use. And now, with the Covid-19 pandemic changing the way healthcare works, there are new opportunities for pharma graduates emerging in the field.
If you see, the Indian pharma industry is holding a prominent presence in global pharmaceuticals arena. Currently, it is the largest provider of generic medicines and accounts for 10% of global production by volume and 1.5% by value. India is home to 3,000 pharma companies and 60,000 generic brands with strong networking of manufacturing facilities across the country. The country visions to become the hub for end-to-end drug discovery in the coming years.
The changing industry trends and global health and economic crisis have contributed to new opportunities for pharma graduates. In the post COVID-19 era, new avenues are opening up for pharma professionals not only in healthcare settings but research, pharmacovigilance, medical coding, regulatory affairs, and marketing. Besides, the emergence of technological advancements has spawned new avenues of business opportunities for pharma companies. Pharma brands have started to devise and adopt digital strategies and newer marketing models to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of digital healthcare platforms. On that note, let us have a look in this article today at some of the opportunities that have emerged for pharma professionals.
New Opportunities in Clinical Research
Clinical research is an emerging field for pharma graduates with a wide scope of career options. As per reports, the post-pandemic era is likely to present a lot of opportunities for pharmacists to look beyond general research and marketing. The scope for clinical research related jobs has already increased by manifold in recent years, and now it is being predicted to expand even further. Since India is an emerging destination for clinical trials by various MNCs, quality academic research and development have always been important. It is expected that there would be a high demand for job roles in this avenue, and the industry would need over 50,000 professionals within a few years alone.
Emerging Career Roles in the Niche of Biomedicines
Gone are the days of conventional molecular medicines as the pharma today is shifting its focus towards biomedicines. The next generation of pharma products will include patient-specific biomedicines, orphan drugs, and advanced medical devices. As a result, the field of biomedical science is rapidly expanding with new career roles constantly being developed. Pharma graduates are expected to take on more of laboratory-based research roles in the future such as biomedical scientist, forensic scientist, clinical scientist/medical physicist, microbiologist, and a wide variety of careers in academia.
Medicine Informatics: A New Age Career Option for Pharma Grads
Medicine Information Pharmacists can be a promising career option in the coming years. According to experts, medicine information (MI) or drug information (DI) is a job role based on providing unbiased, critically evaluated, and evidence-based information about medicines. MI Pharmacists have a wide spectrum of activities, including the proactive provision of information, provision of drug and therapeutic queries, adverse drug reaction reporting, and support for therapeutic training and education. It is a resource-intensive sector demanding evaluated independent information to improve patient care. The generated data helps physicians and pharma companies make appropriate decisions in drug development and health care delivery.
There’s no denying that a well-rounded pharmacy education can propel a slew of career opportunities for the qualified candidates. This is why getting industry-centric pharmacy education from a reputed institution is important. It provides the ambitious minds with the required industry exposure to comprehend the nuances of the industry-work conditions.
To that end, we at the Indore Institute of Pharmacy, recognized among the leading PCI approved pharmacy colleges in Indore, offer an integrative and multidisciplinary approach in pharma education through our cutting-edge pharmacy education programs. We have a highly experienced team of faculty to mentor our students at IIP who take complete care to provide the pupils with the latest knowledge and skills relevant to Pharmaceutical Sciences. With new avenues of career opportunities opening up for pharma graduates, students at IIP are instilled with the required know-how that makes them capable of contributing efficiently to the ongoing growth and development in the domain of pharmacy and pharmaceutical applications.