A defined goal of the SAPhS is the active promotion of pharmaceutical sciences, which also means public appreciation. For this purpose the Swiss artist Willy Engel, Thun, has created the Reichstein Medal for the Academy. This valuable medal shall remember the merits of the Swiss chemist and Nobel Prize Laureate Tadeus Reichstein. This medal may be regarded as a "Swiss Nobel Prize for Pharmaceutical Sciences" and is awarded to individuals of international standing, who have actively contributed to the promotion of pharmaceutical sciences in Switzerland with respect to research, education and professional activities. According to the by-laws of SAPhS, the candidate is selected by the Senate. Selection criteria include:

• international reputation
• excellent achievements, at least partially performed in Switzerland that directly benefited the pharmaceutical sciences in Switzerland
• preferably trained as pharmacist or having received post-graduate training in pharmaceutical sciences
• preferably still professionally active at date of award recognition.

Prof. Dr. Gerd Folkers

Medal winner 2014

Prof. Dr. Gerd Folkers received the Reichstein medal for his outstanding merits as scientist and university professor as well as his significant contributions to the formation of the pharmacy education at Swiss universities. He was a founder member and first president of the Swiss Society of Pharmaceutical Sciences (SSPhS) and is today head of the Collegium Helveticum, an institution of the ETH Zurich and the University of Zurich, studying new scientific perspectives from interdisciplinary processes.

Report pharmaJournal 11-2014 (in German)

Jean-Pierre Lorent

Medal winner of the year 2005

For the first time the Reichstein medal has been awarded for outstanding pharmaceutical services. J.P. Lorent has in the past totally committed himself to implement the ideas of the founders of the Swiss Toxicological Information Centre, which is nowadays internationally recognized for his free toxicological service to anyone enquiring, such having saved numerous lives during its foundation. The excellent reputation of the Tox Centre today has also been achieved by the modest, but the systematic and persevering work of J.P. Laurent.

Werner Glatt

Medal winner of the year 2002

Founder an honorary president of the Glatt group of companies, for his excellence as entrepreneur and for his cooperation with universities promoting Pharmaceutical Sciences.

Prof. em. Dr. Richard R. Ernst

Medal winner of the year 2000

Prof. em. Dr. Richard R. Ernst has been awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1991 for a radical improvement of nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy, therewith creating a powerful diagnostic tool in medicine. After receiving his Ph.D. in Technical Sciences in 1962 from the Swiss Federal  Institute  of Technology in Zurich, he worked five years in California and returned 1972 to Zurich, where he became full professor in 1976.

Prof. em. Dr. Rolf Zinkernagel

Medal winner of the year 1997

Prof. em. Dr. Rolf Zinkernagel, professor of experimental immunology at the University of Zurich and director of the Institute of Experimental Immunology, has been rewarded, together with the Australian immunologist Peter Doherty, with the 1996 Nobel Prize for Medicine. Their discovery, how the immune system detects virus-infected cells is considered to be of trendsetting importance for the clinical medicine and allows the Pharmaceutical Sciences to develop novel vaccines.

Prof. Dr. William I. Higuchi

Medal winner of the year 1994

Prof. Dr. William I. Higuchi is a Distinguished Professor of the Department of Pharmaceutics and Pharmaceutical Chemistry at the University of Utah. He has graduated more than 100 Ph.D. students and is worldwide known because he has authored more than 400 scientific papers and book chapters, has edited the periodical "International Journal of Pharmaceutics" and his leadership in drug delivery. Prof. Higuchi is world-wide known for his rigorous scientific contributions in developing mechanistic models of biologically relevant processes.