Every pharmacist should have prescribing rights!

[morerightsneeded]

Judging from nurses' knowledge of medicines I am inclined to ask for prescribing rights for every pharmacists from the first day they qualify because believe me even the most incompetent pharmacist is more competent than a nurse when it comes to medicines. Junior doctors are just as scary!

I was doing a BP test on a retired nurse. I asked her if she was on any medicines for her BP, to which she replied no. So I asked her for her medicines and her reply was: atenolol, bendrofluazide, felodipine, simvastatin and quinine sulphate!

On another occasion I called a gp to clarify the dosing for lisinopril for an elderly patient. The locum doctor asked me to remind him what lisinopril was for.

nurse prescribers frequently under dose their patients when prescribing antibiotics which is just as bad as overdosing because it encourages resistance and makes the infection harder to eradicate so watch out for that.

The point about doctors is that if they're allowed to pick up experience from practice, why can't pharmacists who study 4 years solely about medicines. In any case pharmacists wouldn't prescribe everything even if given the right, but it could help us to get out of awkward situations legally by being able to prescribe, e.g. if you ran out of the pharmacy only version of levonell one step one could prescribe the POM version and get out of it legally without breaching the law.

Ironically we're allowed to give daktarin oral gel for thrush for children from 2 upwards, yet nystatin is actually safer for children because there is less systemic absorption associated with nystatin. If i were allowed to prescribe I would recommend nystatin to the patients instead.

There are easy conditions to treat if we were allowed to prescribe even with very limited diagnostic skills which will undoubtedly very rapidly develop.

anyone shares my frustration???

[lamzee]

If you have ever worked in a really busy shop, the last thing you will want is MORE things too do. All very nice if you only do about 50 items a day.

[LeftArm]

Yes pharmacists should be allowed to prescribe from a formulary straight away.

I was doing a BP test on a retired nurse. I asked her if she was on any medicines for her BP, to which she replied no. So I asked her for her medicines and her reply was: atenolol, bendrofluazide, felodipine, simvastatin and quinine sulphate!

This is why MUR's are being introduced. The fault lies with the precriber who has not made it clear what the medicines are for.

If you have ever worked in a really busy shop, the last thing you will want is MORE things too do. All very nice if you only do about 50 items a day.

Don't worry about this, all but a few acute scripts will go to internet and warehouse pharmacies.

[DavidS]

Judging from nurses' knowledge of medicines I am inclined to ask for prescribing rights for every pharmacists from the first day they qualify because believe me even the most incompetent pharmacist is more competent than a nurse when it comes to medicines. Junior doctors are just as scary!

There are easy conditions to treat if we were allowed to prescribe even with very limited diagnostic skills which will undoubtedly very rapidly develop.

anyone shares my frustration???

Yes and no.

My belief is that the GP should decide on the diagnosis, and then we should just get on with managing the treatment, referring back as necessary.

We are not trained in diagnosis at college.

[askapharmacist]

In Australia, there has not been a big push for pharmacists to prescribe, and I think this is largely because most pharmacists (in Australia at least) reflect similar sentiments as mentioned here. In most stores, we barely have time to complete the necessary counseling needed let alone the time required to diagnose regularly.

Second there is the unaddressed liability issues, mainly if we misdiagnose, to what degree are we held liable if we believed we were acting within our scope of knowledge.

Much like the previous post, most pharmacists are happy to leave the diagnosing to doctors. While we are trained to perform some basic diagnosing, and have the knowledge to know when to refer, our main task is to deal with medications once a diagnosis is made. So yes, you may decide to advise the doctor of a better treatment once you are told what the diagnosis is, but whether pharmacists should be diagnosing, well, I think we have enough on our plate making sure the drugs are used safely and appropriately, that we don't need extra tasks that take away form our core objectives as pharmacists.

Regards,
AustralianPharma
Ask a Pharmacist

[wwjd_andy]

Doctors should diagnose and pharmacists should prescribe. We are experts on medicines. Nurses have a much stronger lobby. For 150 years, the RPSGB has not lobbied for us.

The demerger of the society has seen a flurry of activity, but it is too little to late! Speak up for us and reduce our fees!

[lamzee]

How could you have time to prescribe, as well as dispense 300 or more items a day? Are you bionic?

[vanquish s]

pass on more dispensing to dispensers, or just up waiting time then u wont have as many items, we do it,

[johnep]

Of course, every pharmacy is well staffed with dispensers just waiting for the next script!

My goodness a pig just flew by.
johnep

[Pharmanaut]

Of course, every pharmacy is well staffed with dispensers just waiting for the next script!

My goodness a pig just flew by.
johnep

Is that an 'Airline pig' or an 'RAF one'?

Was the "Island of Dr Moreaux" on over christmas?