If you work in a doctor's office you know that you are the one that writes the prescriptions, fills out all of the disability paper work, etc., and the doctor simply signs on the dotted line. I would like to throw out this scenario that happened recently in my office.
Patient calls and reported that both she and hubby take the same medication, same strength and wanted a new prescription. However, she only wanted one prescription with double the strength so the both of them could split the pills. This way they only needed to pay for one prescription. Now, granted, this at first appears to be a reasonable request.
If a doctor writes a prescription knowing the strength is double the prescribe amount to save the patient money, is it legal? But wait, the doctor never writes the prescription they only sign it, the nurse writes the prescription. I am all for helping saving patient's money, but not at the cost of potentially jeopardizing my license in the process. To go one further, if the doctor writes the prescription for one patient at double the strength knowing that this prescription will be shared by two patient's ???????????
It is against the law to take medication that is not prescribed for you. I really dislike being put in the position to say NO, but ethically / legally I feel this isn't right. What say you all?
