Doctors demand results of chemist antibiotics trial

The state’s pharmacists have returned fire at GPs’ concerns over plans to let them diagnose and treat some serious conditions.

The war between the state’s pharmacists and doctors has intensified, with the Pharmacy Guild of Australia’s Queensland branch claiming the Australian Medical Association Queensland has hit a “new low” and is using “Chicken Little” tactics in its effort to shame chemists involved in an antibiotics trial.

The Australian Medical Association Queensland said that before Queensland Health moved any further with its plan to allow pharmacists to diagnose and treat more than 20 serious conditions, it wanted results of its trial allowing pharmacists to sell antibiotics for possible urinary tract infections.

The AMAQ demanded to know if bladder cancer diagnoses were missed.

“Today’s media release from AMAQ titled ‘Were bladder cancer diagnoses missed?’ is just another in a long line of Chicken Little commentary that is factually incorrect,” a guild spokesman said.

“We are beyond gobsmacked that AMAQ would deliberately seek to instil fear in women about cancer, when they have been successfully treated for a non-complex UTI, this is reprehensible and a new low for the AMAQ.

“At a grassroots level, Community Pharmacists work collaboratively with doctors and patients to deliver the very best health care, clearly the leadership of AMAQ is out of touch with its dwindling membership, allegedly below 10 per cent of registered doctors.”

“Just a few years ago, the AMAQ claimed lives would be lost if anyone other than GPs were allowed to offer vaccinations – they were wrong then and they are wrong now.”

Earlier, AMAQ president Professor Chris Perry said: “We have no idea of the success or otherwise of the UTI prescribing trial, which started in 2018 and was recently extended indefinitely.

AMAQ President Professor Chris Perry. Picture: John Gass

“Queensland Health and the Pharmacy Guild recently declared it a success, and a huge win for women’s health.

“However, they have not released any evidence of the health outcomes for the women involved.

“UTIs are not always a simple bacterial infection. UTI symptoms are common to other serious health issues, including bladder cancer, chlamydia and kidney infections.”

Professor Perry said diagnoses of these conditions required taking a detailed patient history, physical examination, and ordering tests that pharmacists do not have the authority to do.

“However, pharmacists in this trial were able to charge their patients a non-Medicare fee for their diagnosis,” he said.

“This trial was opposed by hospital pharmacists, urologists, infectious disease specialists, and doctors. It was not a clinically-registered trial, and the only evaluation we have seen so far is the number of prescriptions written.”