Ethical Dimensions of Pharmaceutical Care

Ethical Dimensions of Pharmaceutical Care examines the recent shift in the pharmaceutical field to care provision as the primary definer of what it means to practice pharmacy in the 1990s. In the process, this book encourages readers to reconceptualize their roles as care providers and develop their own solutions to ethical dilemmas encountered in their practices. Realizing that practitioners must ultimately define their own principles and the points at which they are willing to compromise, the authors help readers construct individual philosophical approaches for conducting their services.

An analytical and philosophical guidebook, Ethical Dimensions of Pharmaceutical Care delves into the diverse, yet connected, areas of pharmacy education and practice, ethics, and the ethics of care. Synthesizing theory and practice, it probes stimulating areas such as feminism and pharmacy ethics. It opens the doors to a better understanding of the deeper and multiple meanings of covenant, moral compromise, and integrity.

Bringing together experts from the ethics of care, pharmaceutical care, and pharmacy ethics, Ethical Dimensions of Pharmaceutical Care analyzes the relationships between these disciplines and their combined impact on pharmacy. Professional standards and norms are examined as well as new methods relevant to the daily practice of pharmacy and its future directions. Practitioners, pharmacy academicians, and pharmacy students will find the book?s discussions of the following topics thought-provoking and instructive:

• comprehensive pharmaceutical care
• integrity and the role of the pharmacist
• philosophical issues encountered in practice
• ethical conflict and moral compromise
• the 1994 Code of Ethics for Pharmacists
  
  Ethical Dimensions of Pharmaceutical Care recognizes the value that traditional models of moral rules and principles have had in the various health professions. It contends, however, that the modern health care system requires different methods for practicing ethics. Proposing new approaches that acknowledge the complexity of the modern health care system, this book marks out for the pharmacist a course that will continue beyond the confines of the book.