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The Royal College of Pharmacy (RCPharm) is the body responsible for the leadership and support of the pharmacy profession (pharmacists) within England, Scotland, and Wales. It was created along with the General Pharmaceutical Council (GPhC) in September 2010 when the previous Royal Pharmaceutical Society of Great Britain was split so that representative and regulatory functions of the pharmacy profession could be separated. Membership in the college is not a prerequisite for engaging in practice as a pharmacist within the United Kingdom. Its predecessor the Pharmaceutical Society of Great Britain was founded on 15 April 1841.[3] The organisation officially became the Royal College of Pharmacy on 15 April 2025 [4]

History

The Royal College of Pharmacy was founded on 15 April 1841 as the Pharmaceutical Society of Great Britain, and headquartered at 17 Bloomsbury Square, London. Among its founding members were Jacob Bell and William Allen. The Northern British (Scottish) branch began the same year with nine founders including William Flockhart and John Duncan.[5] From 1843, it had a royal charter that identified its chief objectives as the advancement of chemistry and pharmacy, the promotion of a system of education for its practitioners, and the legal protection of its members.[6]

Headquarters

The headquarters of the college are on East Smithfield Road, located near Whitechapel and St Katharine Docks in London, UK.[7] From 1976 until 2015 the Royal Pharmaceutical Society’s headquarters was in Lambeth on Lambeth High Street, London, UK.[8]

Membership

The college currently offers five categories of membership:

  • Member: Full membership is available to anyone who has ever been registered as a pharmacist in Great Britain, whether or not currently registered with the GPhC.
  • Fellow: Fellowship may be conferred by the college’s Panel of Fellows on pharmacists who have been members of the college for at least 12 years and who have been deemed to have made outstanding original contributions.
  • Associate: Associate membership is open to two categories of person: (a) those registered elsewhere in the world who have never been registered in Britain; (b) those who have a recognized degree in pharmacy but have not yet registered as a pharmacist in Britain, either because they are still undergoing their preregistration trainings or because they are not working in a field of practice that requires registration with the GPhC.
  • Student: Student membership is available to anyone studying for a degree in pharmacy at any institute recognized by the Society (in Britain or overseas).
  • Pharmaceutical Scientist: Pharmacist scientist membership is available to anyone with a degree (or equivalent) in a subject related to the pharmacy who has worked for at least two years in a recognized area of the pharmaceutical sciences.

President of the College

Royal College of Pharmacy

  • 2026 – present Tase Oputu [9]

Royal Pharmaceutical Society (2010-2026)

Publishing

The Society operates two divisions of RCPharm Publishing:

Royal College of Pharmacy Museum

The Royal Pharmaceutical Society of Great Britain has had a museum collection since 1842, which continues to be managed by the college at its offices in East Smithfield. A historical collection was established in 1937 and expanded in the 1940s–1960s by Agnes Lothian.[13] The exhibits cover all aspects of British pharmacy history, and include:

  • Traditional dispensing equipment
  • Drug storage containers
  • Fine “Lambeth delftware” dating from the 17th and 18th centuries
  • Proprietary (brand name) medicines dating from the 18th century to the present day
  • Bronze mortars
  • Medical caricatures
  • A photo archive

Since 2002, the Royal College of Pharmacy has concentrated on developing the collection of historical and contemporary proprietary medicines.

The museum is open to visitors and admission is free.[14] Guided tours are available if booked in advance. In 1983 the Royal Pharmaceutical Society of Great Britain donated over 10,000 historic specimens of materia medica, including crude drugs, herbarium sheets, and slides to the Kew Gardens. This material is now housed in the Economic Botany Collection (EBC) at Kew.[15] The museum is a member of the London Museums of Health & Medicine.[16]


National Pharmacy Boards

The three boards provide professional leadership and advocacy support for pharmacy practice in England, Scotland and Wales respectively. They are currently chaired by Mahendra Patel, Catriona Sinclair and Liz Hallett respectively. The members of the boards are elected by the members of the society,[17] but the members of the senate are not. The members of the senate are elected by members of the boards. The senate is senior to the boards in terms of policy making.

See also

References

  1. ^ “Joe Irvin to chair Trustee Board of future Royal College”. Pharmacy Magazine. 25 November 2025. Retrieved 15 April 2026.
  2. ^ “RPS elects Royal College of Pharmacy president”. Chemist and Druggist. 30 March 2026. Retrieved 15 April 2026.
  3. ^ “About us:history of the society”. Royal Pharmaceutical Society. Retrieved 2 August 2014.
  4. ^ “Our journey to becoming a royal college”. Retrieved 15 April 2026.
  5. ^ Worling, P.M. (1998). “Duncan and Flockhart: the Story of Two Men and a Pharmacy”. Pharmaceutical Historian. 28 (2): 28–33. PMID 11620310.
  6. ^ Kurzer, Frederick (1 October 2007). “George S V Wills and the Westminster College of Chemistry and Pharmacy: A Chapter in Pharmaceutical Education in Great Britain”. Medical History. 51 (4): 477–506. doi:10.1017/s0025727300001770. PMC 2002594. PMID 17932557.
  7. ^ “Contact us”. Royal Pharmaceutical Society. Retrieved 15 April 2026.
  8. ^ “Pharmacy History and Lambeth”. Royal Pharmaceutical Society. Retrieved 25 November 2016.
  9. ^ “President elected for Royal College of Pharmacy”. Pharmaceutical Journal. 27 March 2026. Retrieved 15 April 2026.
  10. ^ “Claire Anderson”. www.rpharms.com. Retrieved 18 July 2021.
  11. ^ “Sandra Gidley”. www.rpharms.com. Archived from the original on 9 August 2019. Retrieved 9 August 2019.
  12. ^ a b c Robinson, Julia; Burns, Corrinne. “Ash Soni to step down as RPS president”. The Pharmaceutical Journal.
  13. ^ “175 years of the Royal Pharmaceutical Society Museum”. The Pharmaceutical Journal. 23 October 2017. Retrieved 4 December 2024.
  14. ^ “Royal Pharmaceutical Society – Museum”. Retrieved 1 January 2018.
  15. ^ Economic Botany Collection
  16. ^ “Medical Museums”. medicalmuseums.org. Retrieved 26 August 2016.
  17. ^ “RPS announces results of 2026 elections to national pharmacy advisory councils”. The Pharmaceutical Journal. Retrieved 15 April 2026.

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