Yesterday, a pharmacy CVC, refused to fill a script for birth control pills. The customer was btw, a married woman with 2 kids. The pharmicist aparently did not believe in birth control, so refused to fill the script. It was discussed at length on the Mark Davis show in Dallas this am. A pharmicist called in to support the other pharmacist. He said that a pharmiacist can refuse to fill any script they choose, b/c they are professionals themselves. Mark Daivs was livid and said if he owned a pharmacy , he would not hire someone who did that. I was in the car, and did not have a phone, so i could not tell him that if he refused to hire someone based soley on that, he would probably be hit with a law suit. Seems it violates your religious rights. Having worked as a nurse for a long time, i had my share of problems with the blood issue. I felt i could not administer blood and even though it was a part of my job, i cited religious reasons. Ideally, what is supposed to happen here is i would assume the responsibility of making sure someone else took care of my patient, so they receive the blood transfusion. Under no circumstances could i just refuse and not provide for my patient. That is a great theory, but in practice, it was hard. No other nurse really wants to take your patient, esp one receiving a blood transfusin, b/c it is a lot of work. And if u are the one nurse who never gets the patients who receive blood, the other nurses will not like it and complain. (unless u are working with a group of your best friends) it is also not fair, b/c as i said, blood is a lot of work. So for me to always not get those patients, is not fair.Eventually, i worked i other areas so as to avoid this issue. Now it would not be an isue.
So back to the pharmacy. What should have happened is if the pharmacist felt it violated their conscience to dispense the pills, then another pharmacist should have done it. Most likely they were the only pharmacist there, so in that case, they shoud have filled the script. Telling the client to go elsewhere, might work, but not in all cases.(insurance problems etc).Also, u can lose a lot of business that way.. It has now been on the news, and i won't shop at CVC, that is for sure.
Personally, i feel the pharmacist stepped way over the line and should mind their own business. Actually the pharmacist can refuse to fill anything, for any reason, so said the pharmacist that called in to the mark davis show. I think that is crazy. If the doc prescribes it, he should fill it. I know as a nurse i have some ability to not administer a drug, ie, if i felt it woud not be ok for the patient at that time.. example, patient wants pain meds. They had pain meds 4 hours previously. I judge them to still be groggy and their blood pressure is low. I would hold off administering anything until the blood pressure came up. (but probably let the doc know) This is different than me dieciding they were not really in pain, or just deciding i don't agree with narcotics and just refusing to administer the drug.
So how would u feel if your pharmacist refused to fill your birth control pills? What if your pharmacist does not agree with anxiety meds, or pain meds? Do u feel he/she had that right? Of course even jack in the box can refuse to serve u, but not b/c of your race, religion or whatever. People only generally do things like that if u are causing a disturbance.
any thoughts?