The Pharmaceutical Journal
Vol 280 No 7491 p243-244
1 March 2008

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• Retention fees
• Contracts
• Prescription charges
• Responsible pharmacist
• Community pharmacy (4)
• Emergency contraception (2)
• The Society (2)
• Drug addiction

Letters to the Editor

Community pharmacy

The Society should take a proactive role

From Mr M. J. Shucksmith, MRPharmS

In response to the letter describing one pharmacist's responsibility for 17,000 items a month David Pruce, of the Royal Pharmaceutical Society, places the onus for action entirely on the individual (PJ, 23 February 2008, p212).

Although I agree that personal responsibility in such situations is clear, surely this is a classic example of where the Society should be taking a proactive role and creating circumstances that are beneficial to both the general public and the pharmacist.

M. J. Shucksmith
Fordingbridge, Hampshire

A perfect prescription processing machine

From Mr W. J. Ambler, MRPharmS

I write in response to Mike Brunt’s letter concerning supervision (PJ, 23 February, p212).

Due to the way pharmacies are paid prescription volume is still the measure of business success. For a pharmacist to suggest to his employer that his workload is too high is to admit that he or she cannot cope. The expected response from the employer is that they will look then for someone who can.

Also the Disciplinary Committee of the Royal Pharmaceutical Society does not look sympathetically on dispensing errors caused by workload. It is a brave/foolhardy/thick-skinned employee who will take a complaint over his employer’s head.

Notwithstanding all the current rhetoric a pharmacist must still be primarily a prescription processing machine.And a perfect one at that.

W. J. Ambler
Leicester

Holistic approach needed

From Mr N. V. Morley, MRPharmS

It was refreshing to read Mark James’s letter, “Category M for muddle” (PJ, 16 February 2008, p180). His suggestion shows that a holistic, joined-up approach is required by all elements of the healthcare chain: suppliers, distributors and primary care contractors.

There is no doubt that in today’s modern medicines management scenarios, this will also have to encompass primary care organisations. Perhaps the paraphrased words of John Donne might be apt: no community pharmacy is an island.

Nigel Morley
Surelines Pharmaceutical Services

What is an acceptable workload?

From Miss C. M. Watson, MRPharmS

Following the letter from Mike Brunt (PJ, 23 February 2008, p212) I would like to see a debate starting around what is an acceptable workload for a pharmacist. I have read the advice given by David Pruce of the Royal Pharmaceutical Society in his response and I have also contacted the Society for advice in the past

I was told that pharmacists must not work in what they consider unsafe conditions but we must also consider the effects on patients if we were to refuse to operate under these conditions. We would, therefore, appear to be between a rock and a hard place. Whistle blowers seldom prosper.

I had a salutary experience just before Christmas. Having almost completed a nine-hour day, supervised 500 items and 35 methadone prescriptions, I took some prescribed medicines out to the last patient of the day, who had patiently waited while the queue died down.

As I handed her the items I saw that tears were rolling down her cheeks. I smiled and asked if she was OK. She nodded and left, and I had no energy to take matters further. I feel I failed as a healthcare professional that day but I could have wept with her.

This is the reality of much of community pharmacy and I, too, wonder how the Society let pharmacy sleepwalk into this state of affairs.

Pharmacists on the frontline with mortgages to pay and families to support cannot fight this battle. We need our leaders to act.

Catherine Watson
Tain, Ross-shire

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