ArticleJournal of pharmaceutical health care and sciences2026
An eight-year national follow-up study on the employment trajectories of early-career pharmacists in Japan up to 2020.
Article in Journal of pharmaceutical health care and sciences, 2026. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Not yet cited in PubMed.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
0 citing papers in PubMed.
No citing paper in PubMed yet.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
5 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundGeographic and sectoral maldistribution of pharmacists has become a critical challenge for Japan's healthcare system. While the number of community pharmacists continues to rise, the chronic shortage of hospital pharmacists persists. This study aimed to clarify longitudinal career trajectories, inter-sector mobility, and predictors of leaving employment among early‑career pharmacists in Japan, using nationwide census‑based data covering all licensed pharmacists.
methodsWe conducted an eight‑year longitudinal cohort study using individual‑level data from the Statistics of Physicians, Dentists and Pharmacists from 2012 to 2020. The cohort included 7,242 pharmacists (3,458 men and 3,784 women) who obtained their pharmacist license in 2011-2012 and were continuously identified in all five survey waves. Employment sectors were categorized into 10 groups. Using generalized estimating equations (GEE), we analyzed the odds of being "unemployed" (defined as having no institutional affiliation), adjusting for gender, survey year, and age.
resultsAt baseline (2012), hospital and community pharmacists accounted for 84.6% of the cohort. By 2020, the proportion of community pharmacists had increased, whereas the proportion of hospital pharmacists had substantially declined. Among those initially employed in hospitals, 34.5% left the hospital sector within eight years, and 83.6% of these individuals transitioned to community pharmacies. In contrast, 88.9% of community pharmacists remained in the same sector throughout the study period. The proportion unemployed among men remained below 1.0%, while the rate among women increased from 0.4% to 3.7%. GEE analysis demonstrated that women had a significantly higher ratio of being unemployed over time compared with men, independent of age (adjusted odds ratio 1.203, 95% CI: 1.118-1.293, p < 0.001).
conclusionsA substantial outflow from hospitals to community pharmacies was observed among early‑career pharmacists in Japan, suggesting that the hospital pharmacist shortage results not only from recruitment challenges but also from significant retention issues during the career continuation process. Additionally, women exhibited a distinctively higher ratio of career interruption. Policies that enhance retention through incentives for specialization in hospitals, along with targeted support for women's career continuity, are essential for sustaining the pharmacist workforce.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.