Four days, two awards. UNE Pharmacy lecturer, Anna Barwick, has had an eventful week.
On Saturday, Ms Barwick's decision to use the COVID crisis as an opportunity to explore ideas about telehealth earned her the NSW Pharmacist of the Year award.
The award was bestowed at the Pharmaceutical Society's NSW/ACT Annual Therapeutic Update (ATU), citing Ms Barwick's 'work in the area of telehealth and improving communications between pharmacists and the general community'.
“Anna’s pioneering work in this field has led to the formation of the PharmOnline, a 24/7 telehealth advisory service which provides opportunities for the community to access health and medicines advice," said NSW PSA President, Chelsea Felkai.
“Her work and advocacy in this field has certainly improved opportunities for rural communities to access advice and treatment opportunities where they have traditionally proved very difficult.”
The pharmacy industry award followed hard on the heels of the March 10 NSW Government announcement that Ms Barwick had been selected to take part in the inaugural Future Women NSW Rural Scholarship Program.
The award gives a select group of women from regional NSW access to the Future Women Platinum+ Program, valued at $5,500 each, which is designed to "connect driven and passionate women from all ages and backgrounds to assist them develop leadership skills and help them progress to the next stage of their career".
Ms Barwick says she tells students that she is not interested in graduating cookie-cutter pharmacists. "We all need an acceptable level of competency, but it is more important to produce pharmacists that are innovative and will improve the profession."
When COVID hit, Ms Barwick saw an opportunity to "walk her talk".
"I knew that our profession was well-equipped to offer our medication expertise beyond four walls and that innovation in the online space was essential."
Her response was to develop PharmOnline, an online advisory service that provides Australians with 24/7 remote access to registered, experienced pharmacists via telehealth consultations.
"Pharmonline now has an amazing team of pharmacists from WA, QLD and VIC that initially volunteered their services, and there are dozens more waiting that we can’t yet accommodate."
"We conduct private consultations with people and refer them back to their local health services and community pharmacy to access recommended treatments or for further investigations. We also offer online 'Conception to Kindy' clinics through maternity units and mother’s groups to provide reassurance and advice about the quality use of medicines to parents."
"I believe we are enhancing the positive perception of the profession by demonstrating a pharmacists’ scope of practice and more importantly, offering patient-centered care at home."
Her background gives Ms Barwick an innate understanding of the particular challenges of regional life, which has fed into her recent awards.
"I grew up on my parents’ organic and biodynamic broadacre farm in Peak Hill in Central West NSW. They instilled in me a strong work ethic and a focus on giving back to the community."
"I enjoyed science subjects and helping people at school, so I initially considered physiotherapy or medicine but quickly realised that I am a hands-off person. I decided to pursue pharmacy after completing work experience in a community pharmacy in nearby town. It became clear how important pharmacists were in their local communities for triaging, diagnosing, treating and supporting people."
She earned her Bachelor of Pharmacy (Hons) at Charles Sturt University, and initially worked in community pharmacy before moving into consultancy work conducting home medication reviews, and aged care service.
Ms Barwick started teaching at UNE in 2012 while working part-time as a hospital pharmacist in Armidale. She is now teaching part-time in pharmacy practice units in 1st, 3rd and 4th year units, along with some teaching into medicine and nursing.
At the same time, she is completing her PhD part-time through the University of Queensland, working on a project that is focussed on rationalising medicines using N-of-1 trials.
