Poor medical sales advice given in UK pharmacies

There have been moves recently to hand more responsibility to pharmacy staff but this research shows it should not be done without first making improvements to medical sales practice at pharmacy level.

The research looked at 101 pharmacies and showed that in 48% of cases advice given in independent pharmacies was unsatisfactory, although the figure was much lower in supermarkets and chains. The poor advice ranged from recommending the wrong treatment, to not exploring what could be serious and requiring referral to a doctor through to simply not offering any advice at all.

The Royal Pharmaceutical Society defended the situation claiming they had made improvements since the last research in 2004, but also pledged to take action to improve the quality of medical sales in pharmacies following this report.