Information for pharmacists planning to move to Australia

I am feeling a little more pessimistic about everything today.  Part of this is linked to the fact that I am on-call, but also after a bit more detailed searching on the Internet, I've come across some bad news.

'Pharmacist' is no longer a qualifying profession for earning points on a skilled migrant visa, (see A-Z list on the immigration website).  This does not affect my visa application directly, as I am applying for partner migration.  What it does suggest is that there is not an abundance of pharmacy jobs available any more.

I have previously mentioned a website for finding hospital pharmacy jobs (SHPA), but recently I have been more keen on the idea of moving into community pharmacy, mainly because it involves no on-calls.  Yesterday I found a website that does advertise community pharmacist posts, but there is very little advertised on there, so it is obviously not used by all pharmacies, (either that or there really are no jobs out there!).

What none of the job adverts say or even any of the pharmacy websites say, is whether they take overseas pharmacists for supervised practice.  If possible I want to be able to sort out some form of employment before we leave as I cannot really afford to be unemployed for too long.  So I did a google search specifically for supervised practice posts, what this revealed were several forums where people were all asking the same question...."How do I organise my supervised practice?".  After reading through the first few pages of a forum called Poms in Oz I found that organising supervised practice is next to impossible until you are in Australia, as no-one seems willing to respond to e-mails.  Even when you are in Australia it sounds like it is a struggle to find someone to take you on, as it is only a 4 week placement, a lot of places can't be bothered with the hassle.

Still maybe I am getting ahead of myself, I still haven't heard back from the APC that they have received my application, and it can take 6 weeks from the date they receive it to process.  Until I hear back from them, I can't even apply to sit the exam, and until I have passed the exam, I can't start to apply for supervised practice.

There is some new information on the APC website, in the form of 5 interactive training modules, which are quite useful in helping anyone prepare for the whole APC process, so if anyone is thinking about the move, I would highly recommend viewing. (Topic 1: Introduction to pharmacy in Australia, Topic 2: Registration to practice in Australia, Topic 3: Preparation for Australian entry assessment, Topic 4: ITP and supervised practice, Topic 5: Techniques for APC assessment).

Adam