A meal at a good restaurant can certainly be therapeutic.

But the notion that someone would stumble into an eatery and mistake it for a pharmacy strikes nearly everybody as farfetched.

That’s why it’s good to see the Missouri Board of Pharmacy agree to work with state lawmakers to resolve the dispute centering o the Smithville restaurant with the word “drugstore” in its name.

Owners Jonathan Justus and Camille Eklof thought they were keeping a tradition alive when they opened a fine dining establishment in the building that had housed the apothecary that had been in Justus’ family since 1842.

They named their business “Justus Drugstore: A Restaurant.”

The name prompted a “cease and desist” order from the Board of Pharmacy, which cited an obscure Missouri law barring businesses from calling themselves drug stores or pharmacies unless they are supervised by licensed pharmacists. The law is intended to protect citizens from inexpert medical advice.

But that’s really not a worry at Justus Drugstore: A Restaurant, where the advice involves things like the wine list and the merits of the curly endive salad.

The pharmacy board, which had threatened legal action, now says it will work with legislators to rewrite the statute so that it doesn’t threaten obviously legal businesses.

That sounds like the right prescription.