Pharmcists Should Stay Out of Mental Health

Pharmacists should stay out of health treatment and do what they do best - glorified clerks. They have no training in curing disease. Their education is solely based on chemical analysis. They are scientists not physicians. Ask their advice and they tell you what is written on the packet.

Now the Pharmaceutical Society of Australia is saying pharmacists are qualified to treat people with mental illness. They may "give" drugs to such patients but they do not prescribe them. Heaven help us if they get involved will-nilly in advising those with mental disorders. Having someone continually talking in your ear about how to take your prescription medicine it not going to help one recover.

Doctors need direct contact with a patient to give the greatest assistance. Having a pharmacist in the middle is only going to mess things up. A mental patient is already stressed. Saying pharmacists will reduce medication errors is implying that they have qualifications to oversee physicians. Obviously, they do not have such expertise.

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Health

Patients Do Not Take Medications Correctly

With probably one of the best prescription medicine schemes in the world which is heavily subsidized it is surprising that many people do not take their medications when they should. A third of patients just forget to take them.

An odd finding is that 67 per cent do not usually miss a dose but 71 per cent take less than the prescribed amount.

New schemes where pharmacists give advice will probably not help because listening now does not affect behavior later. Hospital admissions due to taking more and less than the prescribed medication amount will continue. With the pressures of daily life people seem to have more important concerns than their health.

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Pharmaceutical Society of Australia Gives Money so Flood Affected Pharmacists Can Get Back into Business Quickly

Talk about looking after your own - the better off looking after each other. The Pharmaceutical Society of Australia is setting up a register of pharmacists affected by the floods. Pharmacists in unaffected states are offering to give financial help.

This is disgraceful! What about patients who cannot get necessary supplies, now? This is a case of a privileged group looking after themselves. It should be condemned. It is okay for them to give money to each other. The ordinary person gives a general donation and it is given to recipients based on need.

At a time like this some people think only of money. Getting food, warm clothing and needed medications should be the main priority. The PSA should be giving millions of dollars to welfare organisations for this purpose, not thinking of setting up shop as soon as possible to make money.

The truth is pharmacists don't compete with each other. It is like a "buddy" club.

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Pharmacists Want the Same Rights as Nurses and Midwives

I have been down this path before, but I shall visit it again because of changing circumstances - or should I say because some people perceive that things have changed. Nurses, particularly those in the outback where there is no general practitioner have been given prescribing rights by the Federal Government.

This is a great move forward. Doctors cannot be drawn to the bush no matter haw much they are paid. These nurses save lives. Indeed, they even do serious operations as they are the only ones who can help in an emergency. They should be paid just as much as doctors. They are providing medical services almost equivalent to General Practitioners living in rural communities and helping in any way they can.

What is irksome is that some other "professionals" are getting on the band wagon and demanding rights they surely do not deserve. Pharmacists are condemning midwives and want to take away their authority to prescribe in order to gain the right for pharmacists to prescribe "willy nilly" as defacto doctors. Pharmacists are no more than glorified clerks. Anyone can distribute medications particularly as 99 per cent of drugs are prepackaged in factories. What advice do you get from a chemist - nothing more nor less than what is written on the packet. They often do take liberties and give patients "near enough" medications when they run out of a particular line so as not to lose profit. They do have a vested interest in convincing patients to pay for more expensive medications.

As I have said before, pharmacists learn chemistry in great depth. They do not need such intensive training in one discipline to provide medicines. When has a pharmacist been sued for giving the wrong medicine? They are not held to account and mistakes do occur, but doctors are held responsible. It is like expecting jet pilots to have physics degrees. Pharmacists are over-qualified and this should not be rewarded. If they are to deal with people directly in the prescribing process they should have relevant communication courses in their training program.

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