Patient abuse affecting pharmacy teams’ ability to cope at work

Pharmacy press

Following on from our 2023 Pharmacy Pressures Survey, we were asked to provide further commentary specifically on patient abuse affecting pharmacy teams’ ability to cope at work, as well as the link between wider issues like medicines supply and patient abuse.

CEO Janet Morrison said:

“The results of our recent Pharmacy Pressures Survey were distressing to read, and it was particularly worrying to find that almost half of pharmacy teams cited patient abuse as one of the reasons why they are not coping at work. Acts of abuse and violence should not even be a reality for any pharmacy staff members, and it should never be tolerated. Our survey also found pharmacy staff are increasingly experiencing aggression from patients due to medicine supply issues. This is totally unacceptable.

Pharmacy teams are working immeasurably hard at the moment doing their best for patients in the face of all kinds of pressures, but it is clear more needs to be done to support our pharmacy colleagues who should never have to deal with abuse when they’re simply just trying to do their jobs. The safety and wellbeing of pharmacy staff is crucial and we have been calling on the Government to urgently step in and address the situation pharmacies are facing, including working with other pharmacy organisations to support a petition calling for action to stop violence and abuse in pharmacies last year. More needs to be done to protect pharmacy staff from the abuse that they are reporting and we will keep pushing for other measures to help our pharmacy colleagues.”