David Webb with Debra Humphris and Summer

Pharmacists will play an increasing role in front-line clinical healthcare, Chief Pharmaceutical Officer tells pharmacy students at Brighton

The Chief Pharmaceutical Officer for England, David Webb, on his visit to the university, told students that this was an exciting moment for the profession.

In a speech to staff and students at the University of Brighton this week, David Webb said that changes such as the introduction of prescribing skills training to the undergraduate MPharm degree and the Pharmacy First initiative will mean that pharmacists play an increasingly important role in primary healthcare delivery.

David Webb told the audience: “From 2026, all newly-qualified pharmacists will be independent prescribers. The aim is to enable better patient care and use of skill mix in pharmacy and enable effective deployment of the skills and knowledge of Pharmacists and pharmacy technicians. This is an exciting step towards opening new horizons, across all sectors, including urgent care.”

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Come to an applicant event

Our applicant events are a great way to learn more about your course after you have applied, to get to know us better and make sure we are the right university for you.

To book you’ll need your University of Brighton student number which you’ll find on any emails you’ve received from us about your application.

Online subject Q+A sessions

Online applicant subject q+a sessions are for students who have applied to Brighton – you don’t need to hold an offer to attend. These sessions provide a chance to ask questions to academics and current students before attending one of our on campus applicant days.

If you have applied to study on one of our biology, ecology, biomedical science, geography or environment courses join us online on Wednesday 21 February.

Book your place

On-campus applicant days

Your chance to check out the campus and also attend talks and tasters from your subject academics, our current students, student support services and have a tour of our accommodation. .

If you’ve applied to one of our pharmacy, biology, ecology, biomedical science, geography or environment courses courses we have two upcoming campus events at the Moulsecoomb campus:

  • Saturday 23 March
  • Wednesday 24 April

Book your place

We look forward to seeing you!

School students wearing lab coats learning in a science lab

Sciences Saturday Club

We have an exciting opportunity for secondary school students to take part in a science based project led by University of Brighton staff and students at our Moulsecoomb campus. For anyone interested in science this is a fantastic way to explore the universities labs with hands on experiments.

Students in years 10 and 11 will experience a series of practical workshops delivered in the labs which will explore how science plays a key role in our daily lives. The sessions will cover ‘the Earth from above’ (flying drones), ‘Do fruits have DNA?’, ‘The entangled life of fungi: the good, the bad and the ugly’ and ‘The secrets of the genes’. 

Dates: 3 Feb, 10 Feb, 24 Feb, 2 Mar (no session on 17 Feb due to half term)
Time: 09:30 – 12:30

The Saturday clubs will run over four Saturdays and are free to participants, priority is given to student who are from a widening participation background.

For more information email outreach@brighton.ac.uk

Matt Ingram, Melanie Flint, Kirsty Smallbone, Funmilola and Jenny Minto with one of the mannequins.

‘Sim people’ help teach student pharmacists

Student pharmacists will be able to test their treatment skills on three new ‘sim people’ following a reorganisation of teaching space.

The idea is to hone students’ communication skills and decision-making when faced with patients in a variety of challenging scenarios. By ‘treating’ the mannequins for medical conditions such as anaphylactic shock, taking a blood pressure or responding to unspecified pain, our student pharmacists can build confidence before clinical placements.

  • Safoora Azimi-Yancheshmeh administers asthma medication to one of the 'Sim' people
  • Laptops showing video link of mannequins
  • Dr Funmilola Fisusi demonstrates a therapy session with one of the 'Sim' people
  • Dr Melanie Flint mimics examining the breasts of on of the 'Sim' people

Lecturers don’t even have to be in the room to see how students are performing – they can keep tabs on what’s going on from a separate centre of operations via a live video link. As well as responding realistically to different medications, the mannequins also include a hidden microphone, which will allow lecturers to ‘speak’ on their behalf and respond in real time to what students are doing.

Jenny Minto, Principal Technician in the School of Applied Sciences, has been helping to set up the mannequins. She said: “In the past, students have had to work in quite large groups and haven’t had much hands-on experience, but now they can all have a turn as opposed to watching everybody else. When we get them in small groups, they can really have a go rather than feel embarrassed about getting it wrong in front of their peers.”

The student pharmacists will also be able to practise what it would be like to call other healthcare professionals – for example, to request a consult – via a telephone link from the treatment rooms to the lecturers’ centre of operations.

Hands-on experience

The mannequins were purchased two years ago from Laerdal but the reorganisation of teaching space in Huxley building on Moulsecoomb campus means that they can now be used to their full potential. The fully articulated dummies can be posed in a number of ways and the hope is to have them in a variety of situations – lying down on a hospital bed hooked up to a heart monitor, for example, or sitting up in a facsimile of a GP’s consulting room.

In line with other Inclusive Practice work being done in the School of Applied Sciences, the mannequins were chosen with diversity in mind, with dark hair and skin. They also come with interchangeable genitals and detachable breasts, meaning that student pharmacists can practise treating patients of different sexes – for example, examining the model breasts for lumps to rule out breast cancer.

Dr Melanie Flint, Reader in Cancer Research and the leader of a stress and breast cancer programme at the University, is excited by the possibilities. “I teach the breast cancer case for Pharmacy,” she said. “In our workshops we take students from diagnosis to living with cancer, as part of which an advanced clinical care nurse will come in and show them how to palpate breast tissue. That’s very important for Pharmacy students, with one in seven women being diagnosed with breast cancer in their lifetime. Although Pharmacy students don’t currently perform breast exams, they do get people coming into the clinic with suspected lumps so they need to learn about that.”

Having the mannequins will be invaluable, she believes, not just to give a physical demonstration but as a way of helping students to practise talking to patients. “The most important part is the communication,” she said. “Even if you have somebody who’s newly diagnosed who comes into the pharmacy clinic, if you’ve got a pharmacist who knows about this and can show empathy, they’re the skill sets we want to get from our workshops.”

According to Dr Matt Ingram, Associate Dean (Academic Operations) in the School of Applied Sciences and Principal Lecturer in Pharmaceutical Sciences, the new facilities have the potential to supplement students’ learning in other ways too. “The idea is that, in addition to their usual lectures, the students will be able to book one of the rooms to come in and practise, subject to availability,” he said.

“Thanks to the video links, one lecturer can see what’s going on in multiple different rooms simultaneously – and it can be streamed over Teams so our clinical team can observe when they are off site. There is also a facility to record to the cloud as well as livestream. These systems are fully compliant with General Data Projection Regulations (GDPR). Under supervision, students may be able to watch back and assess their performance later.”

Dr Simon Jeffs close up outside looking at the camera to the side and smiling

Meet Dr Simon Jeffs

Dr Simon Jeffs is Admissions Tutor for our Pharmacy MPharm and Pharmacy MPharm with preparatory year courses.

My journey to teaching
I came to teaching by a very roundabout route via zoology, parasitology, a PhD on tapeworms and 20 years developing HIV vaccines! This has given me a comprehensive knowledge of all types of pathogens and how to control them.

I started teaching medical and postgraduate virology students at Imperial College London then transferred to Brighton.

Continue reading “Meet Dr Simon Jeffs”
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Brighton secures national Silver Award for teaching excellence

The University of Brighton has been recognised for the quality of its teaching and student outcomes in a UK-wide evaluation of higher education institutions.

The university has today secured a Silver award in the national Teaching Excellence Framework (TEF). The award confirms that the student experience and student outcomes across all of the university’s undergraduate provision including apprenticeships are “typically very high quality”, delivering excellence above the rigorous standards set for the UK’s higher education providers. The rating lasts for four years, until September 2027.

The TEF is a national scheme run by the Office for Students (OfS). It aims to encourage universities to improve and deliver excellence in the areas that students care about the most: teaching, learning and achieving positive outcomes from their studies.

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Calebtina holding her award and smiling at the Students Union Awards

Gaining confidence and achieving goals at Brighton

Third-year Pharmacy student Calebtina Peprah received a scholarship through the Student Potential Fund. She has shared with us the positive impact this had made on her studies and her appreciation to the donors for their support.

I am the first person in my family to go to university and was determined to make a bold step and attend university. I have always wanted to pursue a career in healthcare, and I could not hide my joy when I got accepted at the University of Brighton. It was a dream come true.  

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Close up of student working in the lab and smiling

What is it like studying a pharmacy degree?

Hi, I’m Eva and I’m a third year Pharmacy MPharm student. Here is my experience of studying at University of Brighton – from lectures and work experience to getting support, my favourite places, social life, living in Brighton, and tips on making and saving money.

How I found university different from college

I struggled with the jump from GCSE to A-level at college and got really stressed that the only form of assessment was one set of exams. Uni isn’t like that; there are multiple forms of assessment including exams, coursework, and OSCEs (live spoken exams, role play style), assessed at different points throughout the year. This takes some of the pressure off the end-of-year exams and gives me a better idea of how I’m doing academically throughout the year.

Continue reading “What is it like studying a pharmacy degree?”
Abeer Aamir

Brighton pharmacy student wins prestigious national award

Thanks to her exceptional work in advancing equality, diversity and inclusion (EDI) at the University of Brighton, Pharmacy MPharm student Abeer Aamir has won this year’s David Kearney Award from the British Pharmaceutical Students’ Association (BPSA).

Abeer, who has just finished her third year, described herself as “incredibly grateful and humbled” to receive the prestigious national award, which recognises outstanding contribution to pharmacy over the past 12 months. 

The nomination calls Abeer’s commitment to promoting inclusivity and diversity within the pharmacy profession “a testament to her dedication to advancing the field, keeping patients safe, and making it more equitable and accessible for all individuals”.

“As a first-generation immigrant and a pharmacy student, I’ve seen both sides of the coin,” Abeer said. “I’ve seen the ways in which medical racism penetrates the healthcare profession, and it really does disproportionately affect people of colour and women. So, using all that lived experience, I really hope to shine a light on unconscious bias and unconscious medical racism, so that the curriculum is a lot more reflective of the population that our graduates are serving.”

Continue reading “Brighton pharmacy student wins prestigious national award”
Close up of young people in white lab coats using a pipette and test tube

A taste of student life at our Applied Science and Engineering residential summer school

Our on campus residential summer school is open for applications from year 12 students who are thinking about applying to science and engineering courses at university. Apply now.

The summer is school is a real opportunity to try out what it’s like to study at university, learn and use the facilities on our Moulsecoomb campus and stay on site in student halls.

During the day participants take part in a programme of science and engineering taster lectures and practical sessions run by academics and student ambassadors which could include sessions such as blood typing or a session on fungi in the labs. There are also sessions about applying to university, a student life Q&A, a session from the library team and a talk from Brighton Students Union.

In the evenings there are social activities which could be a trip to the beach, a BBQ or bowling before heading back to the halls of residence. Participants share a student flat in our Moulsecoomb halls, with their own bedroom in a flat with 6-8 students and shared living room/kitchen.

In the evenings there are social activities which could be a trip to the beach, a BBQ or bowling before heading back to the halls of residence. Summer school participants share a student flat in our halls, with their own bedroom in a flat with 6-8 students and shared living room/kitchen.

By the end of the week everyone will have tried out lots different science and engineering sessions, made new friends and have a much idea of what it’s like to move to university!

Applications are open until 31 May. We would love to see you there!