BC Hospital Pharmacy Technicians need to transfer bargaining units:

1. To advance the Pharmacy Technician profession

2. To align Pharmacy Technicians with other similar professionals

3. To provide us with more influence at the collective bargaining table

4. For better wages that will reflect the scope & complexity of our duties

Hospital Pharmacy Technicians in BC

As of December 31st, 2015, technicians working in hospital pharmacies in BC had to be regulated by the College of Pharmacy of BC, just like pharmacists. The requirements for this include completing an accredited program, as well as several mandated government examinations & registration fees.

Our scope of practice has increased to incorporate final checking, advanced sterile intravenous admixing, narcotic accountability, sterile chemotherapy admixing, total parenteral nutrition (TPN) calculation and compounding, and taking best possible medication histories. Many of these tasks were traditionally performed by pharmacists, but are now done by pharmacy technicians.

Hospital pharmacy technicians are currently in the Facilities bargaining association (FBA), along with our dietary, housekeeping, laundry, and maintenance workers. While all these roles are critical to excellent patient care, regulated pharmacy technicians' credentials are better suited to the paramedical group.

Hospital pharmacy technicians fulfil all the criteria to be members of the paramedical professionals bargaining unit (PPBU), which also bargains on behalf of pharmacists, cardiology technologists, biomedical technicians, and many other medical technical professions.

Our application to the Labour Board of BC will prove we meet or exceed those criteria (listed below), and that our job classification should be transferred to the PPBU.

We need Funds for the Application

We need to hire our own lawyer to make the application on our behalf. We have already made contact with a labour relations lawyer who can prepare, submit, and arbitrate (if necessary) our application, and he has agreed to take on our case.

Our lawyer estimates we will need to fundraise between $10,000 to 15,000 to be successful. Oftentimes the lawyer needs to defend our case in a hearing for arbitration - this is what can be the most expensive part.

If 500 people each donate $30, we would hit our fundraising goal of $15,000 easily!

As soon as we hit our goal, we will close this campaign and Hire the Lawyer. Our goal is to be fully funded as soon as we can.

Feel free to donate as much as you are able - there is no limit on donation size. Try asking coworkers and family if they are willing to support our cause as well - every little bit helps.

(Donations will be collected until we hit our mark or close to it, at which point the funds will be withdrawn and paid to the lawyer. We will update this page after any withdrawals. Any surplus funds left over after this process will be donated to the Pharmacy Technician Society of BC to help further Pharmacy Technician & Assistant advocacy. (https://www.ptsbc.ca/)

Please support BC Pharmacy Technicians

With your help, we can continue to move our profession forward. As soon as we have raised enough funds to retain our lawyer, we will be ready to go.

Feel free to use the comment section to ask questions or support each other - please remember to be respectful.

Remember to share our donation link with friends, family, colleagues, and anyone else you think would like to donate to help our cause!

The Details:

We know some of you will be curious about the details of what we are doing, so here is the nitty-gritty. Any other questions should be asked in the comments section.

To transfer bargaining units, members of a profession must make an application to the Labour Board of Canada. Each bargaining unit has its own set of eligibility criteria. The criteria to belong in PPBU are as follows:

Paramedical Professional Employees:

are engaged in the health care field in a position involving technical proficiency and scientific knowledge;
hold a degree, diploma or other form of certification from a post-secondary educational institution appropriate to their particular discipline;
are members of a professional or quasi-professional organization dedicated to the advancement of their discipline;
exercise considerable independence of judgement and action;
perform an important role in either: (i) the diagnosis or treatment of patients, residents or clients, or (ii) health promotion, or (iii) the prevention of illness;
can demonstrate that both their collective bargaining aspirations and their community of interest are best met through their inclusion in the paramedical professional bargaining unit.

We meet all these criteria now, as Regulated Pharmacy Technicians practising pharmacy in a hospital setting. See below for examples:

We possess great technical proficiency in all areas of pharmacy practice, from taking patient medication histories to triaging orders and order entry, through to preparation and dispensing. Our scientific knowledge of drugs and their applications helps us to ensure a high standard of patient care in our work every day & assist nurses and doctors when they have questions.
We must pass an accredited pharmacy technician certification program, as well as 3 separate government mandated proficiency and knowledge exams (OSPE, MCQ, & JE). Once these are complete, we must register with the College of Pharmacy of BC for transparency and accountability, which includes a criminal record check and on-the-job structured practical training. To support our development as healthcare professionals, we complete 15 hours of continuing education every year - the same requirement as pharmacists.
All pharmacy technicians are registered with the College of Pharmacy of BC. We also have two well known professional organizations dedicated to the advancement of our discipline, of which many of us are members.
1. CAPT (Canadian Association of Pharmacy Technicians)
2. PTSBC (Pharmacy Technician Society of British Columbia)
Hospital pharmacy technicians exercise considerable independence of judgement and action on the job every day. We are the only set of eyes while preparing sterile products, and we perform the final check on dispensed medications. We triage orders during entry, using our knowledge and judgement to prioritize high priority medications, and delegate clinical requests to our colleagues, hospital pharmacists, whenever necessary.
We perform important roles in all 3 areas mentioned:
1. Technicians scope has increased to include collecting best possible medication histories via direct patient interviews, usually when patients present to the Emergency Department. Our diligence aids other professionals with their diagnoses, assessments & treatment plans. We also dispense medications and information to patients to facilitate treatment in the community.
2. We use our knowledge for health promotion whenever we teach a nurse or patient about the medication they are giving or using, such as how to properly prime an inhaler, or clean an insulin pen, or why they can't crush a pill.
3. To prevent illness, we adhere to strict aseptic techniques when preparing sterile intravenous medications. We also are vigilant for possible drug interactions and patient allergies to alert pharmacists or nurses to potential adverse effects.
We can demonstrate that both our collective bargaining aspirations and community of interest are best met through inclusion in the paramedical professional bargaining unit by comparison to other professionals in the unit - specifically pharmacists.
1. Our annual regulation requirements are the same, including the continuing education component.
2. We work in a similar capacity together to provide excellent pharmacy services to inpatients & outpatients.
3. As our role continues to evolve & grow, we are in an excellent position to support the pharmacy profession and advocate for excellent patient care.

Other professions have successfully transferred bargaining units in the past. Some of them have remained members of HEU, while others have been reassigned to HSA. This decision rests with the Labour Board of Canada, and they will decide which association is a better fit for us after our application has been processed. For more information, please refer to the Labour Board's website.

(http://www.lrb.bc.ca/)

Regardless of which association or union we end up in, transferring to PPBU will better represent our profession, and put us in a better position to bargain during collective agreement negotiations. We can be confident that any effort to advance our profession this way will not result in any significant losses for us once the dust has settled. In fact, there are many similarities between the two bargaining units, and most differences are minor ones. Feel free to browse the collective agreements online for more information.

(http://www.heu.org/collective-agreements-wage-schedules)

(http://www.hsabc.org/contracts-and-bargaining/collective-agreements)

Hospital pharmacy technicians in BC are still part of the current FBA collective agreement negotiated by HEU, which expires this year, in 2019. The next agreement will be in place from 2020 through 2023. Changing bargaining units is our best chance to improve our profession going forward - let's do this together!

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