Are pharmacists sufficiently trained?

At a time when GP services were running well, no-one went to a pharmacist for a diagnosis. It is telling that this route has only become more prevalent as proper medical services have dwindled and people cannot get appointments with their GPs.

Whitewavemark2

Wish I hadn’t started the thread now. 😄

So do I, much like most of your threads whereby you goad into provoking a reaction.

I’ve just had a phone call off a trained pharmacist who was very knowledgeable about other medications I’m taking. I’m going on statins and he’s ordered certain blood tests to check levels in my other meds very carefully described different things @nswered questions and was very good. No problems with me trusting them at least he had time to explain.

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But if it's still red &sore perhaps it IS infected? Certainly sounds like it to me,🤔our new local pharmacist is very good,but trouble is when your on holiday you don't know what they are like.However I'd have thought an antibiotic OINTMENT would have been a better suggestion for an infested foot blister not an oral antibiotic.(several years ago DD had an infected ingrowing toenail and that is what she was given by a dr-it cleared up infection ok.Then he treated the nail.) Same when other DD had an infection down side of a fingernail-what I'm saying is maybe a Doctor would rather treat something small topically rather than by swallowing tablets-but I'd have thought that would be a first step even from a pharmacy.Maybe they had'nt finished all their further training yet as I'm sure some pharmacists CAN already prescribe.🤔

*infected.

I have been in a queue many times where pharmacists have given advice and no documentation of the event seems to happen. Where is the traceability and accountability I wonder. It feels to me very much as though the public are being sold the idea of easy access specialist care where the pharmacists have no or at least very little training in such things. They are after all specialists in pharmacutical matters and not GPs and I feel very sorry for them having had this role forced on them.

Callistemon21

It depends.

Not all pharmacists are trained to Masters degree level.

Some are pharmacy assistants.

That's not true. As a pharmacy assistant of 7 plus years, I can say with confidence that there's a lot a properly trained pharmacy assistant knows and does, but he/she is most definitely NOT the same as a pharmacist, who has undergone many years of extremely specialised training and exams.

I’d say some are some aren’t last year I went to dentist with pain in my gums he give me some antibiotics i said are they ok with my medication I’m on he said yes but ask the pharmacy to make sure. I asked she checked on screen and she said yes so I went ahead and took them 12hrs later I was blue light to hospital my blood pressure was crazy high then flat dropped crazy low I was blacking out and somehow rang 111 who sent an ambulance I spent 4days in hospital on a drip with broken ribs and fractured shoulder. Dr at hospital said on the website that all medical professionals see in red i shouldn’t have been given the pills so for me no i don’t trust them all

Always leave minor injuries dry and as open as possibly consistent with hygiene.
Never use antiseptic creams; they invariably make things worse.
Normally you would expect to trust an actual pharmacist; their training is long and hard and they know more about substances than many doctors do, but diagnosis is not in their remit.

JdotJ

Whitewavemark2

Wish I hadn’t started the thread now. 😄

So do I, much like most of your threads whereby you goad into provoking a reaction.

Well, I think it's a valid topic for a thread.

I think we all know that the current plans for the NHS involve more people who aren't necessarily trained as doctors. Like many, I'm sceptical, but I can also see that if the parameters are tightly controlled, people such as pharmacists, para medics, nurse prescribers, etc have an important role to play.

Quite honestly, we diagnose ourselves quite a lot of the time and we know what treatment is needed. Unfortunately, some of the treatments we give ourselves aren't good, so I think it's useful to have quick access to somebody with a better knowledge of drugs than the average person, with the proviso that people will be advised to see a doctor if the diagnosis is unclear.

I'm thinking in particular of eye infections. Like countless others, one of my children was prone to them. I knew what to do and I also knew when it was serious enough for an antibiotic ointment to be prescribed. I don't know how many times I dragged my daughter to the pharmacist for a second opinion and to buy little phials of sterile water. It was always so frustrating to be told that an antibiotic was needed, but I need to see a GP to prescribe.

I also remember being taken to a pharmacist when I broke my arm as a child. My parents didn't know whether the arm was broken because it didn't hurt. The pharmacist took one look at me and told my parents to take me to A and E. However, if it had have been a bad sprain, I guess I could have been given a bandage and told to rest my arm and saved valuable hospital time.

JdotJ

Whitewavemark2

Wish I hadn’t started the thread now. 😄

So do I, much like most of your threads whereby you goad into provoking a reaction.

I’ll bare that in mind 😄😄😄😄.

I actually had bloods taken on my final trip to A&E and because of the reaction, the Dr decided that evidence of bacteria in my blood was very small, so would not therefore prescribe any further medicine.

So it seems blood tests are good, but I guess expensive, and unnecessary when you can use your common sense. Which I seemed to lack this time around😡

Medical history needs to be assessed. Are you diabetic ! Have you autoimmune disease ? This could lead to anti biotic being prescribed. Nothing and no one is straight forward. Generally pharmacists are very good !

I feel strongly that prescribing medicine or any other form of treatment should be left sole to physicians.

Neither nurses nor pharmacists, however well-trained they may be, have been taught to prescribe for patients and unless their training in the future is to include this, they should not be expected to take on the task.

I had a red and sore eye; consulted pharmacist who said infection and wanted to sell me some drops at £20. Declined and consulted optician; no infection, dry eye syndrome which a £4.95 bottle of Optrex sorted

I absolutely trust pharmacists to advise on drug treatment and on potential side-effects and interactions. That is what they are there for and in my experience they are very good at it.

They are however not diagnosticians and should not be used as such.

My late OH (a doctor) was a brilliant diagnostician with an encyclopaedic memory - other GPs used to consult him when they were puzzled by a patient. That is where a doctor's skill lies.

We are being seriously short-changed under the current system where non-medics of all kinds are making diagnoses - and often over the phone.

I rang my surgery recently about an on-going problem and they said they did not have any appointments but could organise for someone to ring me back from some local private company who provide cover. When the call happened I could tell this person was not a doctor from her vague questioning, and I did ask her if she was a doctor - she said not - she was some sort of medical assistant. She prescribed something which I never collected from the surgery, having put down the phone and looked up the interactions with others I was on.

This is a serious slippery slope of which pharmacists are just one part.

This is not to denigrate pharmacists - most are excellent at what they do.

Pharmacists are taught to prescribe for patients, it is a post graduate level advanced practitioner course, and they cannot prescribe unless they have completed training, passed, and undergone supervised practice which is done by a named GP mentor. They work within strict protocols, deal with minor conditions which lend themselves to a protocol approach, and have the facility to refer directly to a GP if they have any concerns about the condition presenting to them. Pharmacists are highly skilled professionals in their own right, and for their own professional integrity there is no way they would be doing things outside their level of competence.

Some of the comments on this thread are very inappropriate in light of the facts.

A few years ago, my eyes suddenly became bloodshot. I have a history of retinal tear. I went to the pharmacy because that’s what the government were advising people to do. I told the pharmacist my history and symptoms and she advised some over the counter eye drops. I used them but they did not help so I went back. She advised different eye drops. They did not work. I went back and she advised different eye drops again and again, they did not work. I went to the optician who, once he knew my history, told me to go straight to the GP so I did she then prescribed different eye drops. I went home and an hour later the GP phoned me and said on reflection I should go to A&E. I did. I saw the specialist nurse from eye casualty who spoke to the consultant over the phone and was prescribed more eye drops. They did not work and things escalated. I went to eye casualty again and this time saw the consultant face to face. I handed over all the eye drops I’d been given over the week and she was angry. She asked me if I was sure the pharmacist had advised these specific drops because they made the situation worse. So I am not confident that pharmacists are currently trained to diagnose and prescribe. They are trained to fulfil prescriptions for conditions that have been diagnosed by medical staff. Pharmacists are extremely knowledgeable about medications and doses and side effects and contraindications and that is what they are trained to do. This is just the government trying to reduce pressure on GPs and A&E. pharmacists will need additional training to be able to diagnose and prescribe. As I understand it the plan is that they will only be able to diagnose and prescribe for certain conditions only and those that are not complex. None medical prescribing is a post graduate course and those who complete it can only prescribe in their area of expertise.

Pharmacists are experts in medications - they often know more than doctors about medications and how they can interact with each other, if I am prescribed something new by my doctor then I always double check with my excellent pharmacist that it does not contraindicate with anything else I am taking. My pharmacist is brilliant, as are the two locums he uses for his days off and holidays. They are definitely qualified to advise on minor ailments, and also know when to recommend you see your GP or go to A&E. I understand your concern about not wanting to take unnecessary antiobiotics, I feel that way myself. However, a worsening infection really does require them - I was prescribed some over the phone by the Nurse Practitioner at our GP surgery a few months ago, and they really were necessary as it was an abcess that had just burst. The deeper infection needs antibiotics to properly clear up. I do think both doctors and pharmacists are aware of the dangers of overprescribing antiobiotics currently, they do not offer them like smarties as used to be the case.

Pharmacist do continuing education modules, they are extremely knowledgeable. They run to strict guidelines. Being able to nip in and see them without an appointment is a great service. I hope ur foot is ok .

They can access your medical notes and read the updated information.

That service hasn’t been rolled out yet so the pharmacists haven’t been trained for antibiotics prescribing. She erred the side of caution as would a gp . I’m glad your foot healed . Pharmacist sign post conditions to relevant places and deal with much more than pill counting . The blood pressure checks are life savers . These people are an asset to our communitys

In this situation (I know, I've been there) it can be really difficult to tell whether a blister's infected or not. I've had a doctor tell me categorically that there's no infection and ended up on IV antibiotics to sort the problem out.

There are new antibiotics being discovered www.theguardian.com/technology/2023/may/25/artificial-intelligence-antibiotic-deadly-superbug-hospital

and it looks as if some of the panic about antibiotic resistance may be unnecessary.

Pharmacist regularly get 111 calls and do a minor ailment service, if it needs sign posting to another service they will do that on the information received .