The Pharmaceutical Journal
Vol 271 No 7262 p204-205
16 August 2003

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Letters to the Editor

Community pharmacy

Enhancing professional relations

From Mr B. N. I. Bloom, MRPharmS

I fail to see how leaving a patient in pain is “acting in the patient’s best interest”. I would suggest an alternative approach to that described by Paul Radnan (PJ, 2 August, p146).

I would have contacted the patient’s general practitioner and explained the difficulty and suggested the addition of ranitidine together with, perhaps, changing the diclofenac tablets to a modified-release preparation.

I would then have advised the patient to take the antacid before the anti-inflammatory, which should then be taken with food.

The result would have been that the patient’s pain could have been reduced or eliminated, the patient would think that her local friendly pharmacist was terrific, and pharmacist-GP professional relations could have been enhanced.

Everyone is a winner. Such a situation is real and works.

Unless this kind of approach is taken we will all be replaced by “standard operating procedures”.

Bryan Bloom
Leeds

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