Irene graduated from the National University of Singapore in 1997 and did her pharmacist pre-registration training at Singapore General Hospital. In 2004, she went on to receive her Masters in Health Service Management. She was board certified by the American College of Clinical Pharmacy in Oncology Pharmacy in 2005. She is currently the Chief Pharmacist in KK Women’s and Children’s Hospital. Prior to that, she was involved in clinical pharmacy in both National University Hospital as well as KK Women’s and Children’s Hospital.

Irene was involved in many committees for pharmacy, oncology and patient safety on hospital, cluster and national levels and was a former council member of the Pharmaceutical Society of Singapore. She is also actively involved in research pertaining to topics in oncology and, patient and medication safety. She was also able to do volunteer work in Dover Park Hospice despite of her heavy work schedule and having four children to look after.

Irene achieved numerous awards including the prestigious Prof. Lucy Wan Outstanding Pharmacist Award in 2002.

 

 

 

What others have said about Irene:

Irene had always been very patient in guiding and teaching us. She is very approachable and we will not hesitate to consult her whenever we are in doubt. Irene is like a "Big Sister" to us, giving us advice in anything from work to personal family issues. Throughout the few years of working with her, we have witnessed and benefited from all that she fought for us.

Irene is decisive - her vision of pharmacy is very clear and the increasing role pharmacy that has within the hospital is evident.  She is also attempting to give staff more opportunities to grow in their profession.

 

 

An Interview with Ms Irene Quay

A. What would your advice be for the younger pharmacists? Especially when faced with challenges?

We should always place patients before us during our course of work. With that in mind, you will be motivated to do more for our patients. Stay resilient, confident and always be proud of our Pharmacy profession. Pharmacists can do great things for our patients if we have the passion and commitment to make it happen!

 

 

B. What helped / motivated you to be where you are today?

Passion for the profession and commitment to serve patients.

 

 

C. Who would you say is your role model, whom inspired you to excel in the pharmacy field that you chose?

Dr Camilla Wong and Ms Lita Chew. Camilla was my preceptor when I was training in Singapore General Hospital during my pre-registration.  She was very passionate about clinical pharmacy, and had inspired me to work towards the excellent patient care. She was always there to lend a helping hand whenever I needed advice and I was truly appreciative of that.  Ms Lita Chew, via her selfless teaching and her commitment towards oncology patients, had inspired me to specialize in oncology and I am very inspired by her spirit of continuously learning despite having to cope with 4 children, the entire pharmacy department in National Cancer Centre and now heading the Pharmacy profession as the Chief Pharmacist, bringing our profession to newer heights at Ministry level.

 

D. What is the most memorable moment in your pharmacy career?

It was during those days when I was very heavily involved in clinical work in the area of gynae-oncology.  I was spending a lot of clinical time in the ward discussing patient cases with other healthcare professionals and providing the best possible pharmaceutical care to our oncology patients. The satisfaction that I got from patients recovering or palliative patients enjoying better symptom relief from my drug recommendations was unforgettable.

Although I miss my clinical work greatly, I am glad to be in this Chief Pharmacist position which will enable me to influence the profession at a higher level, facilitating  more of our pharmacists to excel in clinical, research and education for the profession and most importantly, for the benefits of our patients.

 

 

 

E. Describe your career progression path.

I did my pre-registration training in SGH in 1997 and moved on to work as an oncology pharmacist in KK Women’s and Children’s Hospital (KKH) for about 5 years where I was actively involved in clinical work and planning chemotherapy protocols.  Thereafter I moved to National University Hospital for about 3 years, before returning to KKH to head the Inpatient Pharmacy section. I am currently the Chief Pharmacist in KKH heading the clinical, research, training, automation and safety track for our pharmacists. I am also actively involved in our hospital’s Closed Loop Medication Management project, which involved electronic inpatient orders, electronic pharmacy verification, inpatient pharmacy automation system for unit-dose packing and bar-code technology for drug administration.  With the pharmacy team effort, we successfully became the first hospital in Singapore to implement 24-hours around-around-the-clock pharmacist verification and that had very significantly brought down our error rates in the hospital!

 

 

F. My future plans

I strive to set up a clear overall structure for our pharmacists to be competently trained so as to develop them into our diverse pharmacy tracks such as Clinical, Research and Education. With this, we hope to be able to develop a Paediatric and, Obstetrics and Gynaecology Residency program in KKH for our future pharmacists and have more pharmacists going into Research and Education in Pharmacy. In addition, I work to continuously push for system change for better patient safety in our hospital.

 

 

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