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· Overseas pharmacists (2)
· Fellowship (2)
· Diamorphine
· Morphine sulphate
· Chloramphenicol
· Drug donations
· The Journal (2)
Letters to the Editor
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Diamorphine
Is destruction ethical in times of shortage?
From Mr J. S. Urwin, MRPharmS
Often community pharmacists will receive back diamorphine ampoules supplied
by them less than a week previously for terminally ill patients who have
since died.
Given the current shortage of diamorphine is it ethical to destroy such
stock?
John Urwin
Seaton,
Cumbria
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PRIYA SEJPAL, pharmacist adviser in the Royal Pharmaceutical Society’s
fitness
to practise and legal affairs directorate, replies:
The Code of Ethics,
Service Specification 2, states that medicines returned to a pharmacy
from a patient’s
home, or a nursing or residential home, must not be supplied to any another
patient.
It would not be appropriate for a pharmacist to redispense a patient-returned
medicine because its quality and safety cannot be guaranteed once the medicine
has left the pharmacy. For example, the storage of the medicine may have
been such that it is no longer efficacious or stable.
Even where there is a shortage of diamorphine, the Royal Pharmaceutical Society
is unable to endorse the supply of patient-returned medicines. |
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The
Pharmaceutical Journal