Martine Kruijtbosch

73 App l i cab i l i t y o f t he Au s t ra l i an Pro f es s i ona l E t h i c s i n Pha rmacy t es t INTRODUCTION Compared to other healthcare practices, like nursing and medicine, ethics receives relatively little attention in pharmacy practice. 1-7 This is surprising considering pharmacists’ worldwide recognition as experts responsible for pharmaceutical care. 2,8 Like other health professionals, pharmacists experience moral dilemmas in their patient-focussed roles. 1 4,5,7,9-11 When confronted with such dilemmas, the right thing to do may not be immediately clear. Moral reasoning is needed to make sense of such dilemmas and to make sound ethical decisions. 5,12-14 This entails reflection on whose and which values are at stake for each of several possible actions as well as consideration of how potential decisions may influence patients’ well- being 12,15-18 Competence in moral reasoning implies that a person has the required knowledge and skills to choose actions that are morally justifiable. Moral reasoning is viewed as one of four psychological processes involved in moral (professional) behaviour; the other three processes are moral sensitivity, moral motivation and moral implementation. 19-21 Although there is no sequential relation between these four processes, all are associated with professional behaviour. 22-24 Empirical studies examining health professionals have shown that moral reasoning can, in itself, contribute to clinical competency and improved quality of care. 15 Thus, there is a need for reliable and valid tests that can measure its development in students and health professionals. 19,25 Moral reasoning development has been measured in pharmacy among both students and practising pharmacists 3,5,26-30 , predominantly in the US 1,30 and mainly with the Defining Issues Test (DIT). The DIT, developed by Rest et al. 15 , is the most widely used moral reasoning test. 15,19,31 The DIT is based on everyday moral scenarios. It was not designed specifically for professional contexts. 31 Tests that are developed for profession-specific contexts may result in more appropriate measures of moral reasoning development in professionals. 22,24,32 Thus, Chaar 33 developed the Professional Ethics in Pharmacy test (PEP test, Appendix) for community pharmacy in the Australian context. Aim of the study The aimof this study is to test the applicability of the Australian PEP test to Dutch pharmacists. Ethics approval and confidentiality As this study did not include patients who were subjected to a medical intervention, this study was not subject to formal ethical approval according to current Dutch law. All participants gave written informed consent for the use of the collected data for the purpose of the study. No data was collected that could link questionnaire data to individual participating pharmacists.