Pharmacists Can Be Liable for Prescription Drug Risks, Appeals Court Finds
June 3, 2005
By:  Curt Anderson

A pharmacist can be held responsible for failing to warn about a medication's risks, even when filling a doctor's prescription, a Florida appeals court ruled.

The 4th District Court of Appeal said the duty to warn about using drugs repeatedly or in harmful combinations is based in the requirement that pharmacists have "general knowledge" of medicines they dispense and the risks they present.

The ruling this week lets Robert Powers pursue claims of negligence against two pharmacies Your Druggist and The Medicine Shoppe that filled his wife Gail's prescriptions for neck and back pain. She died of an overdose in October 2002.

Powers' attorney Peter Herman said the ruling was important for consumers because "a pharmacist is probably going to be in the best position to raise a red flag" about potentially harmful drugs.

Gail Powers, a 46-year-old waitress, had been taking six drugs, including painkillers OxyContin and Percocet and the anti-anxiety drug diazepam. These drugs can be harmful if taken together and some are highly addictive with long-term use, according to the Food and Drug Administration.