RULES around therapeutic substitution are "overly prescriptive" and need to change to ensure pharmacists can support their patients, Pharmaceutical Society of Australia (PSA) National President, Associate Professor Chris Freeman believes.
Speaking at the PSA21 conference last week, Freeman said the Society had worked "side-by-side" with the Pharmacy Guild of Australia to allow pharmacists to deliver continuity of care by substituting medicines in the event of shortages, but was disappointed with the system approved by the Federal Government.
"Unfortunately, the way it was implemented was not what we had put forward," he said.
"It is overly regulated and prescriptive about pharmacists being able to substitute a medicine for an equivalent medicine in a class of therapy, or in a different therapeutic class.
"There's no reason if a medicine - say sertraline 100mg, which we know has been in short supply, can't be substituted for two 50mg tablets.
"My six-year-old can work that out."
Freeman said if the Government wants to enable the profession to better support patients, "allowing pharmacists to do that without having to contact the doctors is what the Government can do".
He added the COVID-19 pandemic had highlighted the importance of continuity of care being delivered through community pharmacy, with continued dispensing measures.
"We fought very hard to ensure that we got Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme (PBS) subsidy alongside that, because we don't want to disadvantage patients from seeing their pharmacist," he said.
"We will fight tooth and nail to make sure that continued dispensing continues outside of the COVID-19 pandemic."
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