Some of you who read my comments and Diaries on Health Care and Pharmacy know me. I'm a liberal pharmacist who is now going to be a Professor of Pharmacy at a large midwestern University, teaching about the duties of a professional, health economics, and health care ethics. I'm passionate about my profession, enough to return to grad school in my my 40's to be able to teach.
The pharmacist bashing that goes on here is sad.
I'm guessing that almost everyone on here has had a prescription filled. Probably most have in the last six months. That filled prescription in your hand is due to the teamwork of the Pharmaceutical Industry, Physicians, Nurses, Pharmacy techs, and pharmacists. Behind the scenes we work together to get you a filled prescription that is right drug, right dose, right dosing interval. With no harmful drug interactions or allegry contraindictions. And we often get physcians to change to evidence based therapy that is often less toxic and expensive than what they orginally prescribed.
We do is despite being the point people for all the flack about insurance. Despite 8 hours shifts (and often longer) with no break, no meals, and 2 min runs to the rest room.
And there is a vocal miniscule minority who are constantly in the news for grandstanding on Plan B. All started by a real piece of work named Karen Bauer, founder and basically about the only member of "Pharmacists for Life". She is a convicted perjurist, fired for lying about a drug being in the pharmacies inventory. The other pharmacists are a few grandstanding zeolots who, quite frankly, piss off most of the rest of us.
For years professionals have been able to defer to another provider to serve the patient is moral issues are there for the original provider. This happens with physicians and nurses too, by the way. It's been quietly taken care of in a seamless manner until these recent rat bastards who do nothing but make a bad name for pharmacy.
These pharmacists are acting in an unethical manner, and the Code of Ethics of the American Pharmacists Association states that "Pharmacists must respect the cultural differences of their patients".
It doesn't mean be a dispensing machine, it means to take care of any issues in a seamless and quiet manner, unknown to the patient.