Register of Pharmacists

In the interests of public protection all pharmacists who wish to practise in Ireland must be registered with the Pharmaceutical Society of Ireland. Under the Pharmacy Act 2007, the pharmacy regulator will publish its Registers online and in one other form. The register, which can be accessed through the PSI website www.pharmaceuticalsociety.ie by clicking on the ‘Search our Registers’ button, includes the details of all currently registered pharmacists and pharmaceutical assistants. The register will be updated daily and will contain the registered details on that day, based on the latest information available to the PSI.

The official ‘registered address’ that registrants are asked to provide as part of the continued registration process is the address of each registrant’s principal place of practice. This is a requirement under section 7 of the Pharmacy Act 2007:

7. (1) Subject to the provisions of this Rule, the following information shall
be entered and kept in the Register of Pharmacists for the purposes of section
13(1)(b) of the Act—

(…)
(c) the address at which the person ordinarily resides;
(d) the address at which the person practises his or her profession as a
pharmacist or, where the person does not currently have a fixed practice
address or is not currently practising, a statement to either effect
whichever is appropriate;

Rule 7(1) requires pharmacists to provide both a residential and a practice address and to simply provide a ‘statement’ in writing to the PSI as to their non-practising status or their inability to provide a fixed practice address (e.g. locum pharmacists would fall into this category).

Rule 7 also provides that the residential address is not for publication on the online register as follows:

(4) The information referred to in subparagraphs (c) and (e) of paragraph (1)
shall not be published on the Internet or made available to the public.

Therefore, it is the practice address that will be published on the Register of Pharmacists, both the online and the hard copy versions, and not the residential address and this protection is provided for in law.

Locums should provide the address of their main place of practice (i.e. their main employer) or, alternatively, the address of the main agency from which their locum services are sourced. If these details change regularly, then the PSI should be updated regularly.