{"id":6727,"date":"2021-01-24T16:05:28","date_gmt":"2021-01-24T21:05:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/desis.osu.edu\/seniorthesis\/?p=6727"},"modified":"2021-01-24T16:05:30","modified_gmt":"2021-01-24T21:05:30","slug":"pharmacist-or-doctor-who-knows-more-about-drugs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/desis.osu.edu\/seniorthesis\/index.php\/2021\/01\/24\/pharmacist-or-doctor-who-knows-more-about-drugs\/","title":{"rendered":"Pharmacist or doctor? Who knows more about drugs?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>By\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/medcitynews.com\/author\/dwilliams\/\">DAVID E. WILLIAMS<\/a><br>Published in Med City News<br>Jun 14, 2010<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I watched a Curb Your Enthusiasm rerun recently in which Larry David has some interesting interactions with a doctor and a pharmacist over a prescription for his father. As usual, there\u2019s an interesting real-life observation in the midst of a lot of nonsense and screwing around.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>To summarize:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li>Larry\u2019s father\u2019s doctor hands Larry a prescription for a blood thinner, which Larry is to fill for his dad<\/li><li>When Larry takes the prescription to the drug store, the pharmacist asks one question: \u201cIs this for you?\u201d and then tells Larry he recommends another product instead<\/li><li>Larry tells the pharmacist that the doctor must have liked the one he prescribed. The pharmacist says again that he likes an alternative<\/li><li>Larry then weighs their credibility out loud: \u201dDoctor\u2026 Pharmacist\u2026 Doctor\u2026 Pharmacist\u2026\u201d<\/li><li>Eventually, he decides to go with the pharmacist\u2019s recommendation and the pharmacist writes down the recommended drug on a piece of paper<\/li><li>Larry takes the new prescription back to the doctor, who is offended and insists he is more knowledgeable than a pharmacist, but then relents and writes a new prescription<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>At the heart of the sketch there\u2019s a sage observation: pharmacists are very knowledgeable about drugs. Much more so than many doctors. And doctors sometimes prescribe drugs without considering the full range of options and almost always without sharing that thought process with the patient (or caregiver).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Many details of the interaction were unrealistic or set up to support the humorous point or the time limits of a TV show. But the most unrealistic part was the pharmacist being so assertive. Usually, pharmacists don\u2019t speak up at all, even when it would be helpful to the patient. That can be because they are too busy meeting their fill quota, they\u2019re too shy to interact with the patient, they don\u2019t want to offend their physician customers (and encourage patients to go elsewhere) or they don\u2019t have the full clinical context.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In any case, this episode gives me a good chance to repost my&nbsp;<em><a href=\"http:\/\/www.healthbusinessblog.com\/?p=1207\">Tips for pharma consumers<\/a><\/em>&nbsp;from 3 years ago:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li><strong>Physicians<\/strong>: When doctors write a prescription they usually whip out the pad, write out the scrip and hand it to you. Next time ask them to share a little bit of their thought process. Why did they choose that drug? What else did they consider? What would their second choice have been? A discussion can be useful: maybe there\u2019s some other information you want to provide, maybe your doctor just prescribes whatever the drug rep recommends.<br><\/li><li><strong>Pharmacists<\/strong>: Pharmacists are the most underutilized health professionals. They go to school for six years and then mainly hide in the back of the pharmacy counting pills. But pharmacists generally know a lot more about drugs than doctors. Plus they\u2019re available in convenient locations and at convenient times. You don\u2019t need an appointment and don\u2019t have to pay. Pharmacists are loathed to second guess doctors, but get to know one and you\u2019ll find they are a great source of information and will even give you their professional opinion on whether you are on the right drug(s). Newer grads carry PDAs with advanced databases on them; every CVS, Walgreen\u2019s and other chain pharmacist can call up a variety of drug information on their in-store terminal.<br><br>Source: https:\/\/medcitynews.com\/2010\/06\/pharmacist-or-doctor-who-knows-more-about-drugs\/?rf=1<br>Image Source: https:\/\/www.wspcrx.com\/news\/time-get-comfort-zone-make-clinical-recommendations\/doctors-working-at-a-pharmacy-looking-at-documents\/<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Analysis:<\/strong><br>This article was interesting because it is an example in pop-culture that notices the public&#8217;s confusion between pharmacists and physicians. The insights within this author&#8217;s work are interesting because he realized that pharmacists know more about drugs, but the public is wary of pharmacists. The author also discusses that pharmacists are the most underutilized health professionals. It&#8217;s interesting that in the show the character weighs their credibility out loud: \u201dDoctor\u2026 Pharmacist\u2026 Doctor\u2026 Pharmacist\u2026\u201d. As if to show that he is trying to consider who to trust. The author of the article also says &#8220;But the most unrealistic part was the pharmacist being so assertive. Usually, pharmacists don\u2019t speak up at all, even when it would be helpful to the patient.&#8221; This is simply seen as the author&#8217;s opinion rather than facts, but it&#8217;s an interesting stigma that is held by the public about pharmacists.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By\u00a0DAVID E. WILLIAMSPublished in Med City NewsJun 14, 2010 I watched a Curb Your Enthusiasm rerun recently in which Larry David has some interesting interactions with a doctor and a pharmacist over a prescription for his father. As usual, there\u2019s an interesting real-life observation in the midst of a lot of nonsense and screwing around. [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":39,"featured_media":6728,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-6727","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-focus"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/desis.osu.edu\/seniorthesis\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6727","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/desis.osu.edu\/seniorthesis\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/desis.osu.edu\/seniorthesis\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/desis.osu.edu\/seniorthesis\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/39"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/desis.osu.edu\/seniorthesis\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6727"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/desis.osu.edu\/seniorthesis\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6727\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6729,"href":"https:\/\/desis.osu.edu\/seniorthesis\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6727\/revisions\/6729"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/desis.osu.edu\/seniorthesis\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6728"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/desis.osu.edu\/seniorthesis\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6727"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/desis.osu.edu\/seniorthesis\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6727"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/desis.osu.edu\/seniorthesis\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6727"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}