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To dispense or not to dispense? Ethical case decision-making in pharmacy practice

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Abstract

In daily practice, pharmacists are regularly confronted with moral problems in which deciding what to do is not always a straightforward decision. In this contribution we show how the use of a specific method for moral deliberation can (in retrospect or prospective) aid moral judgements. We use the case of dispensing isotretinoin to demonstrate one ethical reflection method, namely the Utrecht Method.

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Notes

  1. The Centre for Bioethics and Health Law is currently the Ethics Institute.

  2. For a justification of this standard, see Den Hartogh who argues that a physician is involved in a specific project, and it is contrary to the project to facilitate the birth of a life marred by serious defects. These considerations relate to the quality of life of any future child whomever that may be [14].

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Acknowledgments

We thank the anonymous reviewers for their constructive comments.

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None.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Faculty of Humanities, Department of Philosophy and Religious Studies, Ethics Institute, Utrecht University, Utrecht, The Netherlands

    Ineke Bolt & Mariëtte van den Hoven

  2. Department of Medical Ethics and Philosophy, Erasmus MC, Rotterdam, The Netherlands

    Ineke Bolt

  3. SIR Institute for Pharmacy Practice and Policy, Leiden, The Netherlands

    Marcel Bouvy

  4. Division of Pharmacoepidemiology and Clinical Pharmacology, Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Utrecht University, Utrecht, The Netherlands

    Lyda Blom & Marcel Bouvy

Authors
  1. Ineke Bolt
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  2. Mariëtte van den Hoven
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  3. Lyda Blom
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  4. Marcel Bouvy
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Ineke Bolt.

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Bolt, I., van den Hoven, M., Blom, L. et al. To dispense or not to dispense? Ethical case decision-making in pharmacy practice. Int J Clin Pharm 37, 978–981 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11096-015-0170-8

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11096-015-0170-8

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