Pharmacists often fear complaints

I write in response to Adam Pattison Rathbone’s blog (
The Pharmaceutical Journal

2015;294:
385), where he describes a colleague referring a minor paracetamol overdose in a child to accident and emergency. Perhaps the pharmacist referred the patient because he feared that the patient would go home and Google paracetamol overdose, and then make a complaint about the pharmacist if she thought he had not given adequate advice. The fear of complaints and litigation is, unfortunately, a challenge for all healthcare professionals, including pharmacists.

Rebecca Myers

Cheltenham,

Gloucestershire