Iranian Nurses’ Authority to Prescribe Medications; A Letter to the Editor

Nurses are the largest group of health care providers spending most of their time in touch with patients and are often present at patient bedside immediately when a problem arises (۱,۲). In many countries around the world, nurses are allowed to prescribe some medications, but this is not the case for nurses working in Iran for some reasons (۳) and although nurses are aware of medications used in emergency situations, in Iran, nurses have no legal right to prescribe medications without taking physicians permit and agreement (۴,۵). In this letter, we argued whether or not nurses should have the authority to prescribe medications for patients.