Pharmacists giving nurses meds for personal use

This forum made possible through the generous support of SDN members, donors, and sponsors. Thank you.

ethyl

Go suck on a Zoloft.
15+ Year Member
Joined
Dec 3, 2004
Messages
906
Reaction score
25
Do you ever do it? Is it some unspoken understanding that the nurse can call the pharmacy when their stomach is upset, they have a headache or feeling nauseous?

Members don't see this ad.
 
At our hospital (VA) the policy is that nothing is to be given out (or taken yourself) unless there is a legitimate prescription for it, and pharmacists with prescriptive authority cannot prescribe for anyone other than their patients that they are following, so no pharmacists prescribing for the nurses.
 
Members don't see this ad :)
professional courtesy, OTC is fine


in retail setting, i usually store supply a couple OTC meds/band aids for
staff/front store personnel

yeah, loss prevention and blah blah blah


a lot of these rules makes us health care providers afraid to act in good faith
 
I'm ok with OTCs. Consider it as a professional courtesy as long as long as it's not abused.
 
As a matter of policy we do not give anything except for ibuprofen 200, APAP 500, or tums. We had to do this because many nurses would call and say, "You can give me ibuprofen, why can't you give me zofran?"
 
  • Like
Reactions: 1 user
We charge it as floor stock to the unit....APAP, tums, ibuprofen... We send a whole bottle/box if each. We'll give out the occasional OTC zyrtec or diphenhydramine.
 
At my old hospital, we could do that with OTC meds.
 
I only give Rx meds if the nurse has a prescription for it, ie, she forgot to take her Altace in the am sort of thing. OTCs I give on a prn basis probably like most of you do.

Recent event: a nurse asked me for advice about her lingering cold. The symptoms were waning, but she was still bothered by a cough and post-nasal drip at night. So I asked if the cough was purulent or if she had a fever, headache, or maxillary pain, and she answered in the negative. I advised her to take a Benadryl hs for a few days to help dry up the drip and get some sleep.

An hour later, the physician pokes his head in the pharmacy, script pad in hand, asking for a Zithromax Z-pak. Behind him, the nurse was smiling smugly, having successfully acquired the antibiotics she was looking for :annoyed:
 
We don't give nurses anything. We actually have a sign by the window that says not to ask for meds. On the other hand, we give physicians whatever they want except for narcotics. Pharmacy personnel gets the same treatment as the physicians.
 
I don't give anything, ever....be it RN, physician, or pharmacist. It is against our policy to use our depeartment's OTC drugs for personal use. If they need it, they can run down to the outpatient pharmacy and purchase the OTC. I would never give a prescription drug without a prescription to an employee. If someone has an RX, we can run it through our outpatient system to ensure we get compensated appropriately.

It is your license on the line. Follow whatever policy is laid out by your department.
 
I laugh at some of you smugly not giving the poor nurses anything.

No, your license is not on the line when you give out a tums or a maalox.

To give Rx drugs yes it is illegal to give a drug without a prescription.

To give OTC drugs, it is against our department's policy. It is considered stealing. I'm not losing my job to give some RN a Tylenol.
 
Members don't see this ad :)
Would they really fire you for giving out a Tylenol? Your workplace sounds like that Tim Hortons that fired a woman for giving a Timbit to a child.

You might be happier in a place that isn't run by obsessive-compulsive control freaks.
 
Would they really fire you for giving out a Tylenol? Your workplace sounds like that Tim Hortons that fired a woman for giving a Timbit to a child.

You might be happier in a place that isn't run by obsessive-compulsive control freaks.

Why do I care to give out drugs to employees? What does that have to do with happiness in my job? Personally, I'd rather not be bothered. If you make an exception once, you're expected to do it every time. Trust me, RN's will have no issue trying to get you in trouble if you don't give it to them the next time. "Well so and so gave some to me last week."

Why would I deliberately not follow a department policy? Read closely, I said follow whatever your department requires...
 
if a pharmacist legally purchased a bottle of OTC


a pharmacy tech/nurse asked for it, would you give them a pill that you purchased?
 
if a pharmacist legally purchased a bottle of OTC


a pharmacy tech/nurse asked for it, would you give them a pill that you purchased legally?

question is for Karm12
 
You make a good point about the whole, "You gave it to the other nurse." When you use your own judgement instead of strictly following policy, there will be inconsistencies that can trip you up.

That said, a workplace that employs highly-trained professionals needs to trust their judgement. What I mean specifically: if a nurse approaches me 2 hours into a 12-hour shift, explaining that Aunt Flo visited earlier than expected and she's experiencing cramps from hell, the cost of a 400 mg ibuprofen is dwarfed by the cost of overtime of the other nurses if I say no, and she books off. Ditto the cost of a couple extra strength generic acetaminophen for a nurse with a headache.

100% consistency is 100% dumb. Besides, if you're hard-nosed with coworkers, they'll repay you in kind.
 
We didn't just give them to nurses. We would give them to people from housekeeping, Food & Nutrition, administration, etc. as long as it was OTC and they came to the pharmacy.

One department even requisitioned a box of Tylenol periodically. It was allowed per hospital policy.

We did have a tech who had been recently hired with no health care experience (IIRC, she was a school lunch lady) and had a relative in the hospital who was complaining of heartburn. She walked into the pharmacy and told me that this was why she was taking two Tums, and I told her she couldn't do that, and then had to explain to her why - that we could not dispense anything to patients without a physician's order.
 
if a pharmacist legally purchased a bottle of OTC


a pharmacy tech/nurse asked for it, would you give them a pill that you purchased?

This is giving it from your own personal stock. That is different from the hospital's stock.
 
You make a good point about the whole, "You gave it to the other nurse." When you use your own judgement instead of strictly following policy, there will be inconsistencies that can trip you up.

That said, a workplace that employs highly-trained professionals needs to trust their judgement. What I mean specifically: if a nurse approaches me 2 hours into a 12-hour shift, explaining that Aunt Flo visited earlier than expected and she's experiencing cramps from hell, the cost of a 400 mg ibuprofen is dwarfed by the cost of overtime of the other nurses if I say no, and she books off. Ditto the cost of a couple extra strength generic acetaminophen for a nurse with a headache.

100% consistency is 100% dumb. Besides, if you're hard-nosed with coworkers, they'll repay you in kind.

You're really telling me that there is no other person that they can ask for some IBU or APAP?

I carry my own OTC's for headaches/colds. I apply to the policy to myself as well. Not interested in getting canned for taking drugs off the shelf. Again, follow whatever the policy is for your department and you'll be fine.
 
You're really telling me that there is no other person that they can ask for some IBU or APAP?

I carry my own OTC's for headaches/colds. I apply to the policy to myself as well. Not interested in getting canned for taking drugs off the shelf. Again, follow whatever the policy is for your department and you'll be fine.

I think there was a thread on this a couple of years ago too.

I agree with the above. When I worked at a hospital with a strict policy on personal use, I followed it. That meant nothing but apap 325, ibuprofen 200, and maalox. When I was at a hospital that had no policy, I gave out otc only and that was within reason. I don't know my current employer's policy but in general we carry and share our own supply. Between everyone in my department we usually have large quantities of tums, apap, ibuprofen, sudafed, and benadryl on hand. Why risk my job if the hospital considers it stealing? We have a Walgreens across the street.
 
I had an encounter where a nurse was very nauseous and a physician offered to write her script for Zofran PO. The MD then asked if she could get a pill from me to help her through the shift. I declined and offered meclizine. Still not comfortable giving out PO rx meds to a nurse, though there is no specific hospital policy. I've heard of situations where nursing or other employees may blackmail a pharmacist into giving narcotics.
 
This is a good topic. it's interesting to read the responses. I work night shift so i don't exopect the nurses to go to the outpatient pharmacy since it is closed. I am fine giving out OTC products. I am not sure what the department policy is but so seeing how lenient management is on more serious issues, I can't imagine anyone caring even if what i am doing is wrong.

occasionally a nurse asks for RX only drugs. I definitely say no. There is one physician that sometimes forgets his blood pressure meds when he does an over night shift. I have given him Lopressor a few times. I realize this is technicalyl illegal but I would rather have a healthy doctor attending to patients than one that just stroked out because his blood pressure went through the roof.
 
If a nurse is sick enough to require Zofran, she should really go home rather than be medicated, work her full shift, and potentially spread whatever she has to everybody.

We are officially allowed to give out APAP and ibuprofen. And I'll hand out the occasional generic loratadine to someone with seasonal allergies. But Rx meds are generally out of the question.

The jail I work in is maximum security, meaning it's time-consuming to get in and out of the building. So going to the Tim Hortons across the street takes at least 20 minutes, no matter how fast you walk. And sending them to the drugstore a block away would cost more in lost time than a couple APAP.

I don't think handing out occasional OTCs should be strictly forbidden. But I can understand if you have to be hard-nosed because people abused the privilege.

We used to have a bigger problem with the jail guards treating us like their personal health clinic, ie, coming into the medical unit at all hours demanding to have their blood pressure taken or blood glucose tested, and then getting abusive if nurses don't hop to it because they're busy. (Jail hired an aggressive manager for the medical unit, who put a stop to that kind of thing.)
 
Professional courtesy, but we keep it limited to OTC products to keep it legal (IBU 200, APAP, antihistamines, eye drops, cough drops).
 
i work nights. i give the night staff whatever they need to get thru the night. there is just like 4 or 5 of us regularly. any otc, i store supply so theres your allegra, ibuprofens, zyrtecs

sometimes i give out zofrans and zantac 300s.

thats it. no rx pain meds or anything like that.
 
I would follow whatever policy your business has (and obviously, prescription med would only be given out pursuant to an presriber order.) I've worked in pretty lackadaisical facilities where OTC's were given out as needed. Technically prescription meds weren't supposed to be given out, but there was one staff doctor who would routinely take out BP medicines for himself out of the pyxis...I had suspicions of a couple of nurses doing the same, but nothing provable and management was aware and ignore the issue.
 
If you give out zofran, you should have your licensed revoked. There is ABSOLUTELY NO REASON for a pharmacist to dispense that to a nurse without a valid order.
 
If you give out zofran, you should have your licensed revoked. There is ABSOLUTELY NO REASON for a pharmacist to dispense that to a nurse without a valid order.

Well, the poster did say that a physician was going to write a script for the Zofran. So it would have been legal (although possibly against the posters hospital policy.)
 
Well, the poster did say that a physician was going to write a script for the Zofran. So it would have been legal (although possibly against the posters hospital policy.)
But as far as I know, most inpatient pharmacies aren't able to legally fill outpatient scripts. Am I wrong with this?
 
But as far as I know, most inpatient pharmacies aren't able to legally fill outpatient scripts. Am I wrong with this?

Correct. Usually because labeling requirements are different and inpatient labels don't meet the legal requirement. Plus, the nurse isn't an inpatient, so double boo-boo on the inpatient pharmacy.

Kind of like how ED physicians often aren't credentialed to write inpatient orders.

So I guess the most legal way to get some meds in a hospital w/out an outpatient pharmacy at 3am is to go to the ED and have the ED physician write orders for you, a nurse who is not an inpatient therefore is outpatient, and dispense from there.
 
Top