Abstract
Aim
To explore female community pharmacists’ views on their remuneration and to consider how remuneration levels may influence their work patterns.
Design
Qualitative, semi-structured, face-to-face interview-based study.
Subjects and setting
A purposive sample of 30 female community pharmacists in 12 primary care trusts in the north west of England.
Results
Interviewees were divided on the issue of rates of remuneration. Those who were satisfied either tended to have favourable levels of remuneration, as a consequence of their working arrangements, or did not have to pay for child care. Respondents with dependent children were often the most dissatisfied with remuneration rates. These individuals often worked part time in the lowest paid roles, as employees at a practitioner level. Moreover they sacrificed a significant proportion of their salary in child care payments. A minority of these respondents expressed an intention to quit the profession or stop working. Pharmacists interviewed commonly perceived that their rates of remuneration compared unfavourably with those of other professions and occupations with either a similar or lower level of responsibility or training.
Conclusion
The range of negative comments about remuneration rates suggest dissatisfaction may run high among community pharmacists. Our findings suggest that it might not pay some women, particularly those working in low paid roles who pay for child care, to work as community pharmacists. It is not clear that increasing rates of pay alone would act to increase hours worked by female community pharmacists because other factors may be driving women’s work pattern choices.
