Pharmacists offer an increasing range of products and services today. Going beyond simply dispensing medicine, they’re often a go-to destination for individuals who are feeling sick or unwell and need advice.

Often, pharmacists are able to help and provide invaluable guidance to customers through specialist knowledge and experience. If you own, help to manage, or are part of a pharmacy, it’s wise to take out an appropriate level of locum insurance so that you can keep offering an important service to your community in the event of sickness or absences.

Due to the inherent nature of the trade however, it’s also crucial for you to cover yourself in the event of claims against you for perceived breaches of your professional duties. Based on our years of experience at Locum Insurance, helping pharmacies get the right cover, we explore some of the major considerations you need to make when finding the right policy.

What is Indemnity Insurance?

Known also as Medical Malpractice insurance, Medical Indemnity insurance for pharmacists is an essential cover for pharmacists throughout the country. This protects you against the breach of your professional duties and helps you to handle claims made against you for issues relating to professional negligence.

This cover is also to make sure that, when a person has suffered harm through negligence, they are able to receive the appropriate compensation and costs of litigation that they’re entitled to, following a successful claim.

What Does Indemnity Insurance Cover?

Indemnity insurance can vary depending on your specific policy, but it is designed to provide financial support to members for the following:

• Providing incorrect or harmful advice
• Breaching confidentiality
• The cost of legal representation and associated expenses
• Committing libel or slander
• Compensation awards for acts of negligence, error or omission

If these aspects lead to injury, sickness or disease in some form, then this is considered medical malpractice. Some of these events might occur due to simple human error with no serious consequence, while others may have a more substantial impact on the health of an individual.

For example, wrong dosages or incorrectly dispensing prescriptions, might mean patients are not able to treat themselves appropriately for their relevant health issue, leading to a decline in their condition.

How Do I Find Appropriate Indemnity Cover?

It’s important to make sure that the professional indemnity policy you have in place provides appropriate cover for all your activities. You can do this by evaluating the risk you are exposed to and choosing policies with enough compensation to cover costs, should claims be made against you.

Do I Need Pharmacist Locum Insurance?

Locum insurance for pharmacists is another way you can protect your businesses and keep offering your community the service it needs, no matter what happens. This cover is designed to help your pharmacy cover the cost of any staff absences should someone become sick or get injured.

Essentially, it will pay out a certain amount under specific terms to help you pay for replacement staff or to cover the general costs of running your businesses without a full team.

What Does Locum Insurance Cover?

Locum insurance policies cover a range of different absence types. It can vary depending on your policy, but you can generally be covered for things like illnesses, personal accidents, bereavement and even jury service. Cover can also be extended to cover stress and mental health related absences, as well as maternity cover.

As a majority of staff absences are unavoidable, it’s better to focus on how your businesses can cope when such events occur, rather than trying to find ways to avoid them in the first place.

After all, if your team have the flexibility to take time off when they need to, and without the pharmacy’s ability to run becoming seriously jeopardised, they will be able to operate with lower pressure and can take the necessary time to recuperate and return to full health so your operations can go back to normal.

Taking Out Effective Cover

While you are in the best position to decide on the most appropriate level of cover you need, we can offer you some guidance and advice based on our years of experience at Locum Insurance. Together with the relevant advice from your industry regulators and professional bodies in your sector, we can help you to find suitable cover policies for your needs.