Lessons for Legislators: Allowing Pharmacist-Prescribed Birth Control

Legislators on both sides of the aisle are increasingly looking for ways to address healthcare accessibility and affordability. Over the past few years, many have turned to pharmacists as a way to improve healthcare access and cost. In many states, pharmacists are largely an untapped resource for some primary care services, including prescribing some routine medications, notably for hormonal birth control.

As legislators work to expand pharmacists’ scope of practice to allow them to prescribe hormonal birth control and other routine medications, it is important to highlight best practices that ensure more pharmacists and patients can take advantage of this model. If this model has too many restrictions or does not actually reduce the costs associated with obtaining a birth control prescription, then it is less likely to achieve its goal: safely making birth control more obtainable.

Image credit: Barbara J. Johnson

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