The Department of Pharmacy offers undergraduate and postgraduate studies in the area of pharmacy. The Department of Pharmacy within the Faculty of Medicine and Surgery offers courses aimed at delivering highly competent graduates in pharmacy and pharmaceutical technology at graduate and post-graduate level with attitudes towards innovation and evolvements in professional services.

Outstanding characteristics of the Department of Pharmacy at the University of Malta include:

1. Focus on experiential learning

A characteristic of learning programmes offered by the Department is the focus on experiential learning which allows for the fusion of theoretical aspects with practical reflections in real-world settings, giving the student the ability to develop skills to apply knowledge to practical scenarios. The curriculum for patient-centred pharmacy education provided has been ranked at the top position following the curriculum covered in the USA.

2. Excellent research portfolio

The Department of Pharmacy is a leader in innovative teaching methods and in the evolvement of research skills within graduate programmes. The Department boasts an excellent research portfolio in areas of clinical pharmacy, pharmacogenetics, point-of-care testing, risk-based processes, pharmaceutical regulatory sciences, pharmaceutical analysis, green pharmaceutical synthesis and technology and computational chemistry.

3. Extensive local and international collaborations

The Department has a broad network of local, European and international collaborators so as to ensure relevant and applicable pharmacy education and research. Collaborations cover opportunities with the pharmaceutical industry, government pharmacy institutions, the Malta Medicines Authority, the local competent authority for regulation of medicines and community pharmacies. The Department is a long-standing member of the European Association of Faculties of Pharmacy (EAFP) and the International Pharmaceutical Federation Academic Institutional Membership (FIP-AIM). Currently the Head of Department, is the President of this Association and an elected member of the FIP-AIM Advisory Group.

The Department has extensive collaborative agreements with Colleges of Pharmacy in Europe, the USA and Asia to cover for student mobility, education and research collaboration. The Department of Pharmacy is a champion within the University of Malta of providing an innovative post-graduate programme leading to a Doctorate in Pharmacy degree offered in collaboration with the College of Pharmacy of the University of Illinois at Chicago.

4. Organising and hosting of numerous international activities

The Department has hosted a number of European and International pharmacy activities including the 2nd Spring European Society for Clinical Pharmacy Conference (2001), the 2005 Annual Conference of the European Association of Faculties of Pharmacy and the 7th World Meeting on Pharmaceutics, Biopharmaceutics and Pharmaceutical Technology (2010), and the EAFP-ACPE international workshop on Curriculum design and updating for clinical pharmacy teaching (2017). In 2020, the Department of Pharmacy will be hosting the Annual Conference of the European Association of Faculties of Pharmacy.

5. International recognition and awards

A testimonial to the international standing and the distinction in pharmacy education and leadership are the international recognitions conferred including the Institutional Medal from the Faculty of Pharmacy of the University Complutense, Madrid, the Fellowships conferred by FIP and the European Society of Clinical Pharmacy to Professor Lilian M. Azzopardi and the 2020 Don Francke Medal awarded by the American Society of Health System Pharmacists to Professor Anthony Serracino-Inglott.