They can and should—that’s their area of expertise. I’ve had pharmacists catch dangerous but obscure drug interactions that my doctors failed to catch, typically because the two interacting medications were prescribed by two different types of doctors. Even though both would’ve had access to the same medical records and my full medication list, and even though that data was being checked by a computer, mistakes happen and databases are sometimes incomplete.
I've had pharmacists deny me because I was paying for amphetamine without insurance. They said it was suspicious and refused to call my doctor to confirm that I wasn't some sort of criminal.
That's the kind of unreasonable power that they shouldn't have. Finding bad drug combos? I don't think anyone has an issue with that.
If you find a customer to be suspicious (I was wearing a black t-shirt, to be fair), you should be required to call the customer's doctor office and confirm the prescription.
> That's the kind of unreasonable power that they shouldn't have.
Then the government should come out and say they will not go after pharmacists for filling any and all prescriptions.
The government wants it both ways, keep doctors and pharmacists liable and randomly nail, but not clearly publish standards of rules so no one can accuse the government of intervening in people’s right to healthcare.
Government gets plausible deniability and someone to throw under the bus. No reason for the people that can get thrown under the bus to stick their neck out.
Even if you do everything right they're still often suspicious. I suspect pharmacies keep tabs of "suspicious activity" like asking for an early refill before a work trip.
These secretive DEA limits just underline a weird "moral judgment" of people who have conditions that benefit from stimulant medications. Almost like its our faults for having neurochemistry's that don't uphold the perceptions of a protestant work ethic.
The worse part is that its mostly separated from any particular religion nowadays but agencies like the DEA that essentially self-reinforce this lopsided moral code.
I concur, pharmacists have no legal basis nor license basis in determining the decision making of a licensed medical doctor. The doctor is the one that provided the care came up with the diagnosis and came up with the plan for the prescription for the medication. The only role the pharmacist has is in dispensing that medication. it's wholly inappropriate for a pharmacist to get into the business of second guessing the work of a licensed MD.
For one thing, pharmacists aren’t just retailers. For example, I take a very powerful medication. It’s essential to get the dose just right.
My health care organization employs a pharmacist who sepecializes in the medication, and sets the doses for patients in the program.
This pharmacist doesn’t dispense medication. She instructs the physicians on what dose to prescribe.
I recently had an extremely painful medical event. I was given hydrocodone, but it didn’t have any effect. A pharmacist was called in, and they figured out a drug cocktail that addresses the pain.
Pharmacists really are medical experts and a knowledgeable part of the care team. Doctors should use their expertise more than they do. And it’s completely appropriate for a pharmacist to assertively demand an explanation for what’s going on.
as mentioned throughout the comments I've also seen many situations where patients that were given prescriptions were then turned away by pharmacists because they didn't like the type of clothes that the person was wearing or they didn't think that there was a diagnosis to match the prescription, or that the doctor was too far away in a different town in the same state, Even though the patient might have been taking this medication for 20 years or more... This is only happening recently within the last few years, specifically after the multibillion dollar settlement by CVS and Walgreens that happened in November of 2022... so I'm not buying it that pharmacists are allowed to Trump the decision making of medical doctors.
I guess you are right, according to some articles online [1], a pharmacist can refuse to dispense a prescription due "moral and/or religious" reasons.... so they literally can just look at you and say well you know what I don't think you deserve this stuff sorry go somewhere else and I guess it's perfectly okay, because of a moral duty, which is vague and specious.
