St Vincent's Hospital
St Vincent's Pharmacy Services
Why Choose St Vincent's Hospital?
St Vincent's Hospital offers a dynamic and supportive internship experience, providing pharmacy graduates with comprehensive training and unique opportunities to excel professionally and personally. Our commitment to innovation, excellence, and patient care ensures interns receive exceptional education and support.
Pharmacy Services at St Vincent's
The pharmacy team consists of approximately 80 EFT made up of 124 staff members, including pharmacists, technicians, and support staff, providing decentralised services across nine specialty locations within the hospital. Our pharmacists participate actively in diverse roles such as prescriber-partnered medication charting, clinical informatics and Home & Virtual care services, to name just a few.
Specialised Rotations and Facilities
Intern pharmacists gain exposure through structured rotations across multiple specialised clinical areas, including cardiology, neurology, nephrology and transplantation, oncology and haematology, intensive care, psychiatry, and emergency medicine. Interns also engage with facilities such as aseptic manufacturing, oncology production, and an operating theatre support.
Intern program information
7 intern positions are available.
The pre-registrant program at St Vincent's aims to provide a solid foundation and facilitate a strong transition to practice as a skilled clinical pharmacist to give you the best possible start to your pharmacy career as a hospital pharmacist. Our interns are based at the Fitzroy campus. They also complete a one-week rotation at St. George’s Hospital in Kew.
Structured Education and Training Program
- Orientation and Induction: Comprehensive one-week orientation commencing Friday, 2nd of January.
- Clinical Rotations: Detailed rotation schedule covering core areas such as general medicine, cardiology, neurology, nephrology, gastroenterology, orthopaedics, emergency medicine, intensive care, antimicrobial stewardship, psychiatry, medicines information, medication safety, clinical informatics, and antimicrobial stewardship.
- Weekly Tutorials: Scheduled weekly educational sessions covering clinical topics, OTC primary care, and case studies facilitated by specialist pharmacists.
- Practice Exams: Multiple practice written and oral examinations throughout the year to ensure readiness for registration exams.
- Intern Training Program (ITP): Full support for interns enrolled in the Monash ITP program.
Mentorship and Support
- Formal Mentorship Program: Interns are paired with experienced pharmacist mentors for ongoing professional and personal guidance.
- Supportive Workplace: Our supportive, caring culture promotes work-life balance and professional well-being, enhancing both intern satisfaction and patient outcomes.
Practice-Based Research and Innovation Interns undertake practice-based research projects during their medication safety rotations, cultivating innovation and critical thinking skills integral to their future careers.
Alumni Testimonials Hear from previous interns about their experiences and career development after completing their internship at St Vincent’s Hospital.
https://www.svhm.org.au/education/pharmacy-education
Campuses at which pharmacy interns will work:
- St Vincent's Hospital – St Vincent's Hospital is our main campus, located on the fringe of Melbourne's central business district, bounded by Victoria Parade, Nicholson Street, Fitzroy Street and Gertrude Street. Close to Parliament train station, with numerous tram and bus connections also available, so wherever you live in Melbourne, we are very accessible. St Vincent’s Hospital is also surrounded by Melbourne’s premier parks and gardens, with Royal Exhibition Gardens, Fitzroy Gardens and Parliamentary Gardens only a stone’s throw away, which can be enjoyed at lunchtime or fit in that before or after work run. This main campus offers wide range of medical, surgical, allied health and mental health services, including community, outreach, drug and alcohol and correctional health services. We are also a leading healthcare provider for Aboriginal patients in metropolitan Melbourne. As a major teaching, research and tertiary referral centre, we are committed to providing the best possible patient care, servicing both our local and regional communities.
- St George's Hospital – St George's Health Service, located at 283 Cotham Road, Kew, provides a comprehensive aged care service, including inpatient care, evaluation and management, residential aged care, rehabilitation, acute psychiatry, as well as a broad range of community-based assessment and treatment services. Our interns spend one week at St. George’s.
Our interns begin their internship with a one-week orientation and induction to St Vincent's Pharmacy Services. Following this, the Intern Pharmacist rotations include:
- Clinical ward areas including: General Medicine (3-week rotation), cardiology and cardiothoracic unit (3-week rotation), neurology and nephrology (3-week rotation), gastroenterology (2-week rotation), psychiatry (1-week rotation), orthopaedic unit (3-week rotation), aged care (1-week rotation to St. George's Hospital Campus), emergency medicine (3-week rotation), intensive care (1- week rotation) and antimicrobial stewardship (1-week rotation).
- Dispensary (3-week rotation)
- Aseptic preparations (3-week rotation)
- Medication safety combined with some medicine information (3-week rotation).
NB: Some rotations repeat throughout the year. (See sample 2025 Intern workplace roster below)
Education and training
Weekly Tutorials:
- The education program comprises of weekly intern education meetings. A range of clinical topics is covered. Clinical pharmacists who specialise in areas covered will run these sessions. With OTC primary care topics, our interns are allocated their topics to update and present, and a pharmacist will facilitate these sessions. We also have an in-house OTC booklet that is updated every year by our interns and carried forward for the next year.
Practice Exams:
- Multiple practice exams are provided during the year to help interns prepare for exams; these include both written and oral exams.
Intern Training Program
- We are able to support our interns in their requirements for the ITP. We encourage our interns to select the Monash ITP program as we have the most experience with this program.
Intern Foundation Program:
- St Vincent's is accredited to offer the Intern Foundation Program (IFP). Currently, all seven 2025 pharmacist interns are participating in this program.
Practice Research & Innovation
- Each intern will develop research and innovation skills by doing a practice-based research project. The St Vincent's Pharmacy team will meet to help identify and assist intern pharmacists with these research projects. Interns will work on their projects during their medication safety rotation.
Supervised hours and week-end work
- Interns commence their hours in January. The regular weekday hours are 8am to 4.45pm (if working in the clinical areas) and 8.30am to 5.30pm when rostered to work in the outpatient department area. Each intern will also do a Saturday morning shift every 7 weeks. Saturday morning shift hours are 9am to 1pm (or until the work is finished). One or two public holiday shifts are also worked.
Information Session
Join our informative AdPha webinar. Dates outlined on the AdPha intern page. Contact us directly if unable to attend or you have further questions..
Contacts
- Erini Mathiopoulos, Intern Coordinator
- Email: erini.mathiopoulos@svha.org.au
- Phone: 9231 2844
- Andrew Cording, Chief Pharmacist
- Email: Andrew.cording@svha.org.au
- Helen Dixon, Deputy Chief Pharmacist
- Email: helen.dixon@svha.org.au
We look forward to welcoming you to St Vincent's Hospital, where your pharmacy career begins with outstanding support, education, and opportunity.
Intern positions
- 7 total (7 DHHS funded)