Who will bear legal and professional responsibility for the actions of pharmacist prescribers?
A Pharmacist independent prescribers must accept full professional, clinical and medico-legal responsibility for their prescribing decisions. They should therefore only prescribe in situations where they feel fully competent, using those medicines that they feel are effective for the patient and the condition being treated. Where a pharmacist is appropriately trained and qualified as an independent or supplementary prescriber, and prescribes as part of his or her duties with the consent of the employer or local PCT, the employer may also be held vicariously responsible for the pharmacist ‘s actions. The Department’s Guide to Implementation of Nurse and Pharmacist Independent Prescribing, advises all pharmacist independent prescribers to ensure that they have professional indemnity – for example through membership of a professional organisation or trade union. The RPSGB Code of Ethics states that all pharmacists who own a pharmacy, superintendent pharmacists and pharmacist managers shou
