What Is Ethical Dispensing?
7 minute read
What you will learn
- Define ethics and ethical dispensing
- Explain the main principles of ethics in health care
- Apply each principle to a dispensing situation
- Explain the difference between what is legal and what is ethical
- State why trust matters in pharmacy
- Describe the technician's duty to work within their role
Key points
- Ethics is the set of moral principles that guide what is right and wrong in how we act.
- Ethical dispensing means supplying medicines in a way that is safe, honest, lawful and in the patient's best interest.
- The main principles are doing good (beneficence), avoiding harm (non-maleficence), respecting the patient's choices (autonomy), fairness (justice), honesty and confidentiality.
- The patient's safety comes before profit, convenience and pressure from anyone.
- Something can be legal and still be unethical, so ethics asks more than the law does.
- A technician works within their role and under the supervision of a pharmacist.
- Trust is the pharmacy's most important asset. Once it is lost, it is hard to win back.
A note on this course
BDP 332 in the curriculum lists one topic: Ethical Dispensing, and refers to the lecturer's own notes. These lessons give the general principles and good practice that apply in Nigerian pharmacy. If your school has lecture notes or a code of ethics, use their wording in an examination.
What is ethics?
Ethics is the set of moral principles that guide what we think is right and wrong, and how we should act. Professional ethics is the set of standards that a profession expects of its members, because the public depends on them.
Ethical dispensing means supplying medicines in a way that is:
- safe for the patient;
- honest, with no lying or misleading;
- lawful, within the rules for pharmacy practice;
- in the patient's best interest, ahead of profit, speed or pressure.
Why ethics matters in a pharmacy
A patient cannot check a medicine, a label or a dose for themselves. They trust the pharmacy to get it right. A mistake, a shortcut or a lie can harm or kill. Ethics is how the profession protects that trust.
The principles
| Principle | Meaning | Dispensing example |
|---|---|---|
| Beneficence (doing good) | Act to benefit the patient | Give clear counselling so the patient takes the medicine correctly |
| Non-maleficence (avoiding harm) | Do not cause harm | Refuse to supply expired or damaged medicine, and check doses |
| Autonomy | Respect the patient's right to make decisions about their own care, with proper information | Explain the options and the risks, and respect an informed choice |
| Justice (fairness) | Treat patients fairly and equally | Serve people in order of need, without favour or discrimination |
| Honesty | Tell the truth | State the true price, and the true strength, source and expiry of the medicine |
| Confidentiality | Keep patient information private | Do not discuss a patient's medicines in public or with those who have no need to know |
Sometimes principles conflict. For example, respecting a patient's wish (autonomy) may risk harm. In such cases, ask the pharmacist.
Legal and ethical are not the same
| Legal | Ethical | |
|---|---|---|
| Question asked | Is it allowed by law? | Is it right? |
| Source | Laws and regulations | Moral principles and professional standards |
| Example | A pharmacy may legally sell a medicine over the counter | It is unethical to sell a large quantity to someone who is clearly misusing it |
The law sets the minimum. Ethics asks for more. A good technician follows the law and asks what is right.
The technician's role and limits
A pharmacy technician:
- works under the supervision of a pharmacist;
- performs tasks within the technician's training and role;
- does not prescribe, diagnose or change a prescription;
- refers questions beyond their role to the pharmacist;
- keeps learning, so that skills stay up to date.
Acting outside this role, even with good intentions, is an ethical and a legal risk.
Habits of an ethical dispenser
- Put the patient first, every time.
- Double-check every prescription and label.
- Admit mistakes at once, so they can be fixed.
- Respect privacy, and speak quietly at the counter.
- Be honest about what the pharmacy has and what things cost.
- Do not accept gifts or pressure that could influence what is dispensed.
- Behave the same when no one is watching.
Exam focus
- Define ethics and ethical dispensing in your own words.
- List the principles of ethics and give a dispensing example of each.
- Explain why patient safety comes before profit.
- Common mistake: thinking that anything not forbidden by law is acceptable ethically.
Quick check
Test yourself before you move on. Pick an answer to see the explanation.
1.Ethical dispensing means supplying medicines in a way that is:
2.Refusing to supply a medicine you know is expired is an example of which principle?
3.Keeping a patient's medicine details private is an example of:
4.A practice is not forbidden by any law, but it would put a patient at risk. It is:
5.A pharmacy technician works: