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References

Public Health England. Dental prescribing dashboard 2020. http://www.gov.uk/government/publications/dental-prescribing-dashboard-2018 (accessed November 2021)
Roberts RM, Bartoces M, Thompson SE, Hicks LA. Antibiotic prescribing by general dentists in the United States, 2013. J Am Dent Assoc. 2017; 148:172-178
Marra F GD, Chong M, Sutherland S, Patrick DM. Antibiotic prescribing by dentists has increased. Why?. J Am Dent Assoc. 2016; 147:320-327
Faculty of General Dental Practice, Royal College of Surgeons of England Faculty of Dental Surgery. Antimicrobial Prescribing in Dentistry. Antimicrobial Prescribing for General Dental Practitioners. Good Practice Guidelines. 2016. https://cgdent.uk/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/Antimicrobial-Prescribing-in-Dentistry-2020-online-version.pdf (accessed December 2021)
Pharmaceutical waste reduction in the NHS. 2015. http://www.england.nhs.uk/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/pharmaceutical-waste-reduction.pdf (accessed November 2021)
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Pharmaceutical waste: Where's the harm?

From Volume 48, Issue 11, December 2021 | Pages 926-930

Authors

Aoife Burke

BA, DipDH, Sch Dental Hygienist, Final year dental student, DDUH

Articles by Aoife Burke

Email Aoife Burke

Aoife Hutchinson

Final year dental student

Articles by Aoife Hutchinson

Bridget Johnstone

BSc, MSc, PhD, Health Economics

Articles by Bridget Johnstone

Maitray Varma

BSc Final year dental student

Articles by Maitray Varma

Hanan Husain

Final year dental student

Articles by Hanan Husain

Holly Porter

Final year dental student

Articles by Holly Porter

Fiona Rickard

Final year dental student

Articles by Fiona Rickard

Iriene Sebastian

Final year dental student

Articles by Iriene Sebastian

Hermela Tecle

Final year dental student

Articles by Hermela Tecle

Brett Duane

BDS MAM (Health), MPH, PhD

Associate Professor in Dental Public Health, Dublin Dental University Hospital

Articles by Brett Duane

Abstract

Increasingly, healthcare practitioners need to be concerned not only with the type and dose of the medication prescribed to dental patients, but also to how waste is managed. This article discusses the results of a literature review on the harm both to the environment and population health caused by pharmaceutical waste and looks at potential ways of mitigating this worldwide problem.

CPD/Clinical Relevance: The dental team needs to consider how they manage not only general clinical waste but their specific responsibility for pharmaceutical waste

Article

Dental professionals have a duty to do no harm, but there is a lack of consideration by the dental team given to the harm caused by pharmaceutical waste (PW) and related poor waste management practices. Dentists prescribe a considerable amount of medication. From 2017 to 2020 for example, dentists in England prescribed 13,235,561 items, with dentists responsible for prescribing 10% of antimicrobials.1,2,3,4

There has been no calculation of how much waste occurs within dental prescribing. Within broader healthcare, the pharmaceutical industry produced $900 billion in prescription medicines globally. Within England, the NHS alone reports that annual management of pharmaceutical waste costs £300 million annually.1,2 An estimated 1.27 million kg of prescription medications are left unused by consumers in the US annually.3

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