Pharmacy Education and Clinical Pharmacy Training in France

Abstract

Clinical pharmacy education varies widely between European countries, and several major changes have taken place in France. This review aims to describe the current state of pharmacy education in France, focusing on clinical pharmacy. Research into legislative texts on pharmacy education in France was conducted based on the national database “legifrance”. A complementary search on clinical pharmacy teaching methods used in France was carried out on the Medline, Embase, Pascal and Francis database for articles published from 2008 to 30 April 2021. Pharmacy studies are taught in universities and last from six to ten years, depending on the student’s chosen options. The scientific curriculum is defined at the national level. Students choose their professional path after the fourth year with specialized courses. Whatever the direction chosen, all students have several internships, including a half-time one-year hospital internship, with patient-centered hospital functions within medical and pharmaceutical teams. The status of clinical pharmacy has been enhanced under French law and regulations, improving clinical pharmacy education, which is now skill-based, in a progressive, active, and dynamic process, with community or hospital pharmacists as university teachers and closer to real-life clinical pharmacy. Teaching is increasingly innovative, and this needs to be shared and reported in the literature. Several important reforms have modernized French pharmacy studies in recent years, conferring a pivotal place for clinical pharmacy.