Exploring pharmacy ethics in developing countries: a scoping review

Background Healthcare ethics have been profoundly influenced by principles of bioethics that emerged post-World War II in the Declaration of Geneva 1948. ‘Beneficence’ (to do good), ‘Non-Maleficence’ (to do no harm), ‘Justice’ (fairness and justice in access) and ‘Respect for Autonomy’ (respect for patient individuality, including decision making, privacy, and right to refuse), have become foundational principles of contemporary medical codes of ethics. These principles are well reflected in most professional pharmacy code of ethics globally. This domain remains relatively unexplored in most developing countries and the majority of what has been published in this area relates to western cultures. There have been no attempts to pool findings from a similar scope of research emanating in developing countries. Aim of the review This study aims to explore the scope of pharmacy ethics in the literature pertaining to developing countries. Methods An extensive search of three relevant (Scopus, CINAHL, IPA) databases was conducted from Jan 2000 to Feb 2020, in order to identify relevant studies conducted in or focussed on ethics in pharmacy in developing countries. A separate Google Scholar search was carried out in an effort to locate supplementary articles, hand-searched articles were also included to achieve an exhaustive investigation of all current relevant studies. Results The full text of 20 relevant articles that met inclusion criteria were critically analysed and qualitatively categorised into three emerging themes; Ethical challenges in pharmacy practice, Approaches used in teaching pharmacy ethics, and Code of ethics analysis and implementation. Conclusions: Findings of this literature review illuminated a gap in pharmacy ethics literacy in developing countries and variances in pharmacists’ ethical attitudes in handling ethical dilemmas, as well as a lack of familiarity with ethical principles and codes of ethics. Pharmacists’ lack of respect for patients’ autonomy and pharmacists being prone to financial pressure were found to have a significant impact on pharmacy practice in most of developing countries. However, attempts are being made to rectify this gap by efforts to incorporate ethical and professional education in undergraduate curricula, and by studies in which new codes of ethics are being implemented.