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January  ^919™"  )  National  Pharmaceutical  Service  Association.  45 
THE  NATIONAL  PHARMACEUTICAL  SERVICE  ASSO- 
CIATION: ITS  PAST  WORK  AND  FUTURE  AIMS. 
By  George  M.  Beringer. 
At  the  request  of  the  Executive  Committee,  the  following  state- 
ment, reviewing  briefly  the  activities  of  this  organization,  has  been 
prepared  for  dissemination.  It  is  very  appropriate  that  at  this  time, 
the  officers  should  present  to  the  members  and  friends  a  resume  of 
the  work  in  which  this  association  has  been  engaged  and  the  reasons 
for  continuing,  even  more  strenuously,  our  efforts.  It  may  be 
considered  as  a  report  by  the  executive  officers  of  the  management 
and  discharge  of  the  duties  assigned  to  them. 
The  National  Pharmaceutical  Service  Association  grew  out  of 
a  meeting  of  medical  practitioners  held  at  the  Philadelphia  College 
of  Physicians  and  Surgeons  on  Wednesday  evening,  June  20,  1917, 
to  which  a  number  of  pharmacists  had  likewise  been  invited.  At 
that  meeting  a  number  of  the  eminent  physicians  and  surgeons 
present,  whose  age  debarred  them  from  active  military  service,  de- 
cided to  organize  a  medical  Reserve  Corps  and  through  this  to  offer 
their  professional  services  to  the  government  during  the  war. 
Recognizing  that  in  civil  practice,  physicians  depended  upon  the 
cooperation  of  the  pharmacists  and  that  pharmacy  formed  an  im- 
portant link  in  the  ethical  practice  of  medicine,  this  meeting  of 
physicians  adopted  a  motion  suggesting  that  a  similar  reserve 
pharmaceutical  corps  be  organized  to  cooperate  with  the  medical 
corps  in  rendering  efficient  service  to  the  government,  if  the  need 
should  arise.  The  following  pharmaceutical  and  drug  trade  organ- 
izations of  Philadelphia  were  represented  at  that  meeting:  The 
Philadelphia  Branch  of  the  American  Pharmaceutical  Association, 
The  Philadelphia  Association  of  Retail  Druggists,  The  Philadelphia 
Drug  Exchange,  and  the  Philadelphia  College  of  Pharmacy.  The 
representatives  of  these  organizations  called  a  joint  meeting  of  their 
members  at  the  Philadelphia  College  of  Pharmacy  on  June  25,  at 
8  p.m.  to  take  action  upon  the  suggestion  emanating  from  the  meet- 
ing of  June  20,  and  to  determine  the  best  method  of  mobilizing  the 
pharmaceutical  interests  to  the  support  of  the  government. 
It  is  a  peculiar  coincidence  that  the  American  Pharmaceutical 
Association  was  organized  in  the  Philadelphia  College  of  Pharmacy 
