It aimed at building the capacity of community practice pharmacists in the region with up to speed information and ideas to effectively dispense and report drugs related health effects. Participants were also introduced to service delivery skills, new concept of patient reporting for optimum patient engagements to immensely benefit their communities and  pharmacists.

The workshop formed part of the support for pharmacovigilance by the United Kingdom (UK) with the objective to improve consumer and public education as well as patients safety through identification of drug safety issues.

It was organised by the FDA in collaboration with the Community Practice Pharmacists Association (CPPA) and funded by the United Kingdom Kingdom Agency for International  Development (UKAID).

Speaking at the opening of the workshop, John Odai-Tettey, Acting Regional Head of the FDA explained that the objective of the training was to encourage proper use of drugs, patient engagements and adherence to basic instructions on drug use and pharmacovigilance.

He pointed out that, patients safety was vital in the treatment regime of ailments and as such the FDA was particularly concerned with working to reverse the appalling trend. To achieve that feat, he called for effective collaboration between healthcare professionals and the regulator as that could significantly contribute towards the realisation of better treatment outcomes.

He encouraged health professionals to report all suspected adverse drugs reactions due to medical error, lack of efficacy or therapeutic failure, suspended pharmaceutical or medical device defects as well as blood and blood products whether known or unknown.

Mr Odai-Tettey further noted that the safety of patients was a shared  responsibility of all stakeholders including doctors, pharmacists and patients. "We are in this together and hope to get to our destination together with the cumulative efforts of everyone especially our community pharmacists who have been equipped with the skills and tools for effective patient engagements” he said.

Mr Abu Somaila, Western Regional Head of FDA who spoke on the theme: "Safety monitoring of medicines", advised the participants to regularly visit the FDA website to be abreast with the changing trends in medicine dispensing and new safety regulations and precautions.

He urged the pharmacists to incorporate routine patient  monitoring  and assessment of drug related problems in their communities to keep them up-to-date with patients safety information.

As part of their mandate, he encouraged them to retrain their pharmacy staff on drug safety and stressed the need to remain alerted to assisting the FDA in early detection of safety issues with drugs and vaccines including counterfeits and substandard medicine.