JOURNAL OF CHEMICAL EDUCATION
CHEMISTRY IN THE FOUR-YEAR COLLEGE OF PHARMACY CURRICULUM' WALTER R. WILLIAMS. University of Connecticut College of Pharmacy, New Haven, Connecticut
PEA~ACY is an ancient and honorable profession possessing a wealth of historical background and tradition. It occupies an important position among the present Public Health professions and holds promise of becoming even more important in the future. In addition to his traditional functions of preparing and dispensing medicinals we see a trend toward the use of the pharmacist, with his scientific training, as a means of dissemination of public health information. He is becoming increasingly important as a consultant to the physician on such matters as dosage, mode of administration of medications, and the pharmacological action of drugs. Presented before the New England Association of Chemistry Teachers, St. Thomas Seminary, Bloomfield,Connecticut, March 27, 1948.
In the last few decades, pharmacy has been passing through a period of transition from apprentice to college trained personnel, somewhat similar to that once experienced by medicine and dentistry. Even though in 1900 several American Schools of Pharmacy were well established and already teaching pharmacy in academic full-day courses as a scientific discipline (and not in evening courses as a supplement to store practice), no state then required college training for licensure to practice pharmacy. In 1916 only seven states required graduation from a College of Pharmacy as a prerequisite for licensure. Gradually as the value of college training in pharmacy gained recognition, the. original two-year curriculum was changed to one of three years and, in a short time, to a full four-year course. Since 1932 a full academic, four-year study has been recog-
JANUARY, 1949
nized as the minimum course by those schools of pharmacy holding membership in the American Association of Colleges of Pharmacy. In 1947 forty-five states required graduation with a degree of Bachelor of Science in Pharmacy as prerequisite to licensure to practice pharmacy. A survey of the curricula of the 72 colleges of pharmacy in the United States today shows that nearly all offer courses in a t least three of the four fundamental subdivisions of chemistry, namely: inorganic, organic, and analytical. Many also offer physical chemistry, especially for those who intend to do graduate work and research, or enter the field of pharmaceutical mannfacturing. Some Colleges of Pharmacy present courses in the chemistries which are almost exclusively specialized and apply only to pharmacy and its related sciences; others offer courses which are a blend of the regular academic type mith some specialization. The major portion of colleges, however, present regular academic work in chemistry in the first two years of study and then construct the advanced courses on a more specialized basie of pharmaceutical application. The latter arrangement obtains a t the University of Connecticut College of Pharmacy. In the first year is included a prescribed course in general inorganic chemistry. This is the same type chemistry as is given in most academic colleges, everincreasing stress being placed on the physicochemical aspects of matter and less time being spent on the socalled descriptive chemistry. Matter is studied from the viewpoint of electronic structure, and properties and uses are correlated with structure. Problems are widely used to illustrate laws and principles. In the first year laboratory a manual has been selected .which places the accent upon experiments of a quantitative nature rather than a series of short test tube experiments, although some of the latter are included since they are best suited to a study of the properties of the common elements and their compounds. Early in the laboratory work the student becomes familiar with the use of the torsion type prescription balance which is sensitive to 5 milligrams mith a maximum load of 50 to 100 grams and in some experiments weighs to the nearest f5'milligrams. Results obtained in such experiments as the determination of the atomic weight of lead by gravimetric procedure (dissolving c.p. lead in nitric acid and precipitation and weighing as the chloride), determination of the valence of magnesium by displacement of hydrogen and determination of the molecular weight of naphthalene or some unknown organic compound by freezing point depression and boiling point rise of a solution in carbon tetrachloride or benzene are more than satisfactory. Furthermore, weighing to the second or third decimal place makes later discussions of the degree of accuracy and liiitations of the above methods assume greater significance to the freshmah st,udent,. In the sophomore year are offered the analytical chemistries along with organic chemistry. Inorganic
qualitative analysis in the first semester is followed by inorganic quantitative analysis in the second semester. With but few exceptions, pharmacy colleges throughout the country have retained qualitative analysis as a separate course and have not incorporated it into the first-year general inorganic chemistry. The majority of them offer the regular academic type course with some special procedures peculiar to pharmaceutical analysis toward the end of the course, Thus, a t our college the student is required to be able to solve problems based upon the common solution phenomena such as L., Km, K,.,., etc. Known and unknown mixtures (liquid and solid), consisting of the common anions and cations, are separated and identified. Then the qualitative analytical procedures peculiar to pharmacy are studied by way of a few typical compounds official in the United States Pharmacopoeia XIII. Such a compound is hydrochloric acid requiring a modified Gutzeit test for arsenic and a heavy metal test (a blanket test using a control solution of lead nitrate to show presence of permissible or excessive amounts of heavy metals which are precipitated by hydrpgen sulfide). While quantitative analysis is made a highly specialized course in some colleges of pharmacy, many others including our own, offer the usual analytical course including the common gravimetric and volumetric procedures. Wherever choice allows, however, compounds and procedures official in the United States Pharmacopoeia or National Formulary are selected: tincture of Iodine or Lugol's solution (a solution of iodine in aqueous potassium iodide) for iodimetry, lime mater for alkalimetry, tincture of ferric chloride for an iron compound, ammonium or sodium chloride for chloride ion. Aspirin makes an excellent sample for acidimetry and also serves to illustrate residual titrations. I t is in this course that the embryo pharmacist learns to exercise due respect for the balance and for burets and pipets as measuring devices. Here he learns the significance of sensitivity of the balance, the importance of calibration of weights and the fine distinction between accuracy and precision. Because of its extreme importance as a prerequisite for such related subjects as physiology, pharmacology and pharmacy, organic chemistry is best offered in the second year. This is a regular college elementary organic chemistry course in which no attempt is made to limit the compounds and procedures studied to those of pharmaceutical importance, for the classes of organic compounds which find no application a t some point in pharmaceutical practice are few indeed. It is here that the student becomes familiar with the functional groups which are to become more important to him in his later studies of pharmacy and materia medica. The laboratory er~tailslypical methods of preparation of representative aliphatic and aromatic compounds, and a study of the reactions and properties of the various . classes of compounds. A few experiments introduce the student t,o means of differentiation of one class of compounds from another, but no systematic identification of unknowns is carried out as in some academic courses.
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By the end of the sophomore year the pharmacy student has received a sufficient foundation in chemistry so that he is able not only to undertake a study of the more specialized chemistries related to his major fieldpharmacy-but can more intelligently advance in his study of such sciences as physiology, bacteriology, and pharmacology. One of the specialized chemistry courses as applied to pharmacy is that referred to as drug assay or drug analysis. This is offered as an elective in the junior year and includes such procedures as alkaloidal assay, ash and moisture determinations, and analysis of volatile oils for certain specific principles such as total esters, aldehydes, or ketones. In addition such physicochemical tests as determination of solubility, specific gravity, refractive index, and rotatory power are utilized as a means of establishing the purity of a medicinal substance. Of the applied chemistries offered in the senior year, one of the most important is that called pharmaceutiial chemistry. This is a two-semester course and in many colleges of pharmacy includes laboratory as well as didactic exercises. The work of the first semester includes some advanced inorganic chemistry and places special emphasis on the preparation, properties, and therapeutic uses of those elements and compounds which are official in the United States Pharmacopoeia and National Formulary or are otherwise of pharmaceutical importance. In the second semester the organic chemistry of medicinal substances, their preparation, reactions, and therapeutic classifications are studied. This phase of pharmaceutical chemistry is becoming more and more important as the number of organic medicinals which pass the clinical tests, are accepted by the medical profession, and become official in U.S.P. or N.F. is growing a t an ever increasing rate. Mention of such organic medicinals as the sulfonamides, the estrogenic hormones, and the anti-histaminic substances should sufficeto make the reader conscious of this trend. Biochemistry is another elective which is usually offered in the senior year. As given in most colleges of pharmacy, including our own, it is essentially a laboratory course in which emphasis is placed more upon the human aspects of biological chemistry. Laboratory exercises include inspection of urine samples, work in blood chemistry, and a study of the metabolism of carbohydrates, fats and proteins. 'A study of the vitamins and hormones and determination of sulfonamides in blood and urine are also taken up. The aim is not to produce finished technicians hut rather to instill in th'e presumptive pharmacist an appreciation of and the ability to critically evaluate clinical data. Some other elective courses of a chemical nature, not offered by the University of Connecticut College of Pharmacy a t present, but worthy of mention here since t,hey am found rather frequently in other College of Pharmacy catalogs, are: chemot.herapy, chemical microscopy, chemistry of colloids, plant chemist~y,food and drug assay, guide to chemical literature and semi-
JOURNAL OF CHEMICAL EDUCATION
nars of various sorts. The varied requirements of certain localitiesaswellasthetypeof position in which the graduate pharmacist intends to serve account for the inclusion of such specialized courses in the curriculum. Our senior students do enjoy one semester of seminar . work in which the majority of subjects repqrted upon are invariably newer organic medicinals. The student is required, however, to briefly cover the pharmacological and pharmaceutical applications as well as the chemistry of such substances. This makes for an excellent correlation of chemistry with the other basic sciences upon which pharmacy is founded. Time and space will not allow for an extensive discussion of the many applications which the practicing pharmacist may make of his training in chemistry, so that a few random generalities will have to suffice. Proper storage and preservation of both chemicals and preparations affected by atmospheric moisture or oxygen as well as by heat and light can best be accomplished by the pharmacist if he is familiar with the properties of these substances. Of what avail that he weigh carefully on a class A prescription balance in sufficient quantities to reduce the error to accepted tolerances if the substance being weighed has deliquesced or partially effloresced? In this same vein of thought the pharmacist must be able to recognize or, if he suspects it, test for deterioration in his compounds and preparations so that he will not be dispensing agents of reduced or no therapeutic value. When two or more chemical substances are to be compounded into a single prescription there is always an opportunity for chemical incompatibility to occur. Should this occur, the pharmacist must be able to avoid or overcome the incompatibility, or if this is not possible suggest some alternative procedure to the prescribing physician. Colloid chemistry is &ding wider application in pharmacy in such. cases as the use of emulsions as a means of administering medicinal agents, of newer types of bases for ointments superior to the older fatty or hydrocarbon bases, and of colloidal forms of medicinal agents like sulfur and silver proteinate. Since such a large percentage of medication is administered in solution form a thorough familiarity with solubilities and knowledge of solution phenomena is extremely important to the pharmacist. A recent trend in this particular field is the careful regulation of osmotic pressure (isotonicity) of preparations intended for use in the eyes or nasal passages, thus producing a preparation exhibiting less discomfort to the patient and possessing enhanced therapeutic value. Because the pharmacist, unlike the physician, offers a material commodity (the prescription) in addition to his professional service, he is too often considered by the public as just another businessman like the butcher, the baker, and the grocer. Too often the professional aspect of the pharmacist's calling is entirely overlooked. The modern college-trained pharmacist is gradually gaining, both from the physician and socict,y, i.lie rccognition for pharmacy which it right,fully deserves by applying this training toward the betterment of public health and well being.
