'Utmost urgency': Should Ontario pharmacists get OK to prescribe for minor ailments now?

Come January, pharmacists in Ontario will be able to prescribe for 13 minor ailments, but some are saying that date should be moved up—and the number expanded. “It’s absolutely ridiculous to wait the usual wait time when you’re going through very unusual times,” says Kyro Maseh, owner of Lawlor Pharmacy in Toronto. “This is something that needs to be treated with the utmost urgency.” He points out that emergency departments across the country are under extraordinary strain, with many closing temporarily due to staffing shortages. A recently published study from researchers at the University of Waterloo backs up the idea that pharmacists can help reduce ER visits, finding that pharmacists could potentially defer 4% of all emergency department visits. Read: Minor ailments regulation changes approved, date set for when Ontario pharmacists can start prescribing Justin Bates, the CEO of the Ontario Pharmacists Association, agrees that offering access to minor ailment prescribing earlier than Jan. 1 is a good idea. “Certainly allowing us to do things like minor ailments today, would help ease some of the burden [on the system[,” he says. “That said, we’re not talking about a huge gap between now and January.” He says for that reason, moving up the date isn’t his top priority. “Right now our focus is continuing collaborative discussions with the Ministry of Health to ensure [minor ailment prescribing] is publicly covered." However, he does believe the list of minor ailments should be expanded. While Ontario pharmacists will be able to prescribe for 13 minor ailments, those in other provinces can already treat more. In Alberta, where minor ailment prescribing for pharmacists has been in place for the longest, pharmacists can treat over 50 different conditions. Read: Pharmacists prescribing for minor ailments saves healthcare dollars “I had one case where a patient was diagnosed over the phone with an eye infection, and it was shingles, which you have to address in a very timely fashion if you don’t want it to progress,” says Maseh. “Now, she’s had eye damage.” Maseh thinks allowing pharmacists to prescribe for gout is logical, and would ease some of the strain on emergency departments, and that pharmacists being able to prescribe Paxlovid would help reduce hospitalizations. Allowing pharmacists to do routine immunizations would also help. Maseh says he’s frustrated that he can’t offer routine vaccines, such as those for shingles and pneumonia, which have clear guidelines on who should receive them. “For us to have to sit down and to fax a physician, they have their administrative staff look at the fax, send it to the doctor, doctor looks at it, faxes over a vaccine request, we dispense it, send the patient back to the doctors office so they can get injected . . . not only is this an issue of patient well-being, it’s a waste of my time and it’s a waste of the doctors time.” Read: Pharmacists in Yukon get power to extend prescriptions permanently, soon to prescribe for minor ailments

'Utmost urgency': Should Ontario pharmacists get OK to prescribe for minor ailments now?

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