After the Zurich electorate approved the initiative “Yes to freedom of choice in obtaining medicines” on November 30, 2008, residents of the cities of Zurich and Winterthur have finally been able to choose freely where they want to obtain their prescription medicines since May 1, 2012.
They use this freedom. So many of them continue to go to the nearest pharmacy and have their pharmacist give them the medication. Others greatly appreciate the fact that they can obtain the painkiller or antibiotic directly from the doctor’s office. A third group of patients has their medications delivered to their homes by their neighborhood pharmacy or by a mail-order pharmacy.
The option of running a patient pharmacy is only used by a minority of practicing physicians in the two cities, which means that even now the majority of city dwellers can only choose between an office pharmacy and a mail-order pharmacy. Several reasons keep these colleagues from directly dispensing medications. For example, the many regulations that must be followed, whether or not one considers them useful.
A pharmacy wants to be professionally run and managed. It ties up human resources and places high demands on the physician and his or her staff. Inventory management plays an important role, as it is important to keep the warehouse as small as possible while always having the required medications on hand. So colleagues who keep an electronic medical record also benefit when running a practice pharmacy, because most practice programs support inventory management and proper billing. In addition, interactions are automatically checked and shown when the medication list is created. It is therefore hardly surprising that modern practices in particular run a pharmacy, to the delight of their patients.
It is to be hoped that after the vote on September 22, 2013, it will also be possible for colleagues in Aargau to offer their patients full freedom of choice when purchasing medications.
