Two Sudbury coworkers are looking forward to opening the city's newest pharmacy in the South End next week.
Pharmacists Sami Dabliz and My Phuong Tran (Ghorbani), who have worked together for close to 20 years, will be opening the new Regent Street Pharmacy. Both are members of the Ontario College of Pharmacists and graduates of the University of Toronto.
Calling it the new beacon of health care in the South End, the store is set to open on May 13 at 1650 Regent Street, just across from the Telstar Avenue intersection.
Dabliz said after working in the corporate retail pharmacy business for two decades he felt the time was right to branch out on his own.
"I worked for them for about 20 years; my partner worked for them for about 18 years,” he said. “So both of us, you know, close to 20 years each. And we just felt it was time."
He said the new pharmacy will be able to better meet the specific needs of the area customers and be more flexible in giving clients what they want.
"We thought it was something that was lacking a little bit in the South End of Sudbury. So we thought it was a good opportunity to put a new pharmacy in there," he added.
Dabliz said he is also pleased that the Ontario government has expanded the list of ailments and conditions that can be treated by pharmacists prescribing things like ointments and antibiotics for common things like acne, canker sores, diaper rash, yeast infections, hay fever, acid reflux and pink eye.
Dabliz said he is happy to be able to provide more services to the public. He said that is likely going to become the more normal thing for pharmacists, going forward.
"And those are all things that we're very comfortable doing. So I think that it really allows us to fill a need, because if you think about the huge shortage of family doctors that's going on right now, right?" said Dabliz.
"Some of the simple ailments, if we can take care of that and take that burden off them a little bit, then that helps them to do the things that they need to do," he added.
"And I think a lot of people just find it convenient."
Dabliz said pharmacists are fully aware of the need to "stay in their lane" and anything that is beyond their scope would be referred to a physician right away.
"So you're not really trying to take anything away from them,” he said. “You're just trying to alleviate some of their work burden, basically."
Regent St. Pharmacy will offer a comprehensive range of pharmaceutical services and healthcare amenities, including medication therapy management, immunizations/injection services, minor ailments prescribing, compliance packaging, topical compounding as well as an easy to use refill smartphone app.
Dabliz said the pharmacy will accept all major drug plans and will be open seven days a week with local delivery.
Len Gillis covers health care and mining for Sudbury.com.
