one of my pharmacists found this and it is sooo true.
Why your Pharmacist (and tech) hates you so much....
I Realize Today I've Done You A Disservice
WARNING: This post may be painful for those in the profession to read.
For over a year and a half now, the first thing anyone visiting my little
blog garden has seen under the headline at the top of the page is the
promise that the question of "why does my prescription take so
damn long to fill" will be answered. Tonight I looked over this blogs
archives and realized it was a promise not kept. While many topics have
been covered here, and you have been provided with ample evidence
of how drugstore workday life does indeed warp the mind, the question of why
it took 2 hours for you to get 20 Vicodin has
remained unanswered. I can't help but to think there may be someone out
there who has been logging on every day for the last 18 months hoping in
vain for this mystery to be solved. Should such a person exist, I offer my
humble apologies. To everyone else, I offer the following prescription
scenario:
You come to the counter. I am on the phone with a drunk dude who wants the
phone number to the grocery s tore next door. After I instruct him on the
virtues of 411, you tell me your doctor was to phone in your
prescription to me Your doctor hasn't, and you're unwilling to wait until he
does Being in a generous mood, I call your doctors office and am put on hold
for 5 minutes, then informed that your prescription was phoned in to my
competitor on the other side of town. Phoning the competitor, I am
immediately put on hold for 5 minutes before
speaking to a clerk, who puts me back on hold to wait for the pharmacist.
Your prescription is then transferred to me, and now I have to get the 2
phone calls that have been put on hold while this was being done. Now I
return to the counter to ask if we've ever filled prescriptions for you
before. For some reason, you think that "for you" means "for your cousin"
and you answer my question with a "yes", whereupon I go the computer and see
you are not on file.
The phone rings.
You have left to do something very important, such as browse through the
monster truck magazines, and do not hear the three PA announcements
requesting that you return to the pharmacy. You return eventually,
expecting to pick up the finished prescription.....
The phone rings.
.......only to find out that I need to ask your address, phone number, date
of birth, if you have any allergies and insurance coverage. You tell me
you're allergic to codeine. Since the prescription is for Vicodin I ask you
what exactly codeine did to you when you took it. You say it made your
stomach hurt and I roll my eyes and write down "no known allergies" You tell
me......
The phone rings.
......you have insurance and spend the next 5 minutes looking for your
card. You give up and expect me to be able to file your claim anyway. I
call my competitor and am immediately put on hold. Upon reaching a
human, I ask them what insurance they have on file for you. I get the
information and file your claim, which is rejected because you changed jobs
6 months ago. An asshole barges his way to the counter to ask
where the bread is.
The phone rings.
I inform you that the insurance the other pharmacy has on file for you isn't
working. You produce a card in under 10 seconds that you seemed to be
unable to find before. What you were really doing was hoping
your old insurance would still work because it had a lower copay. Your new
card prominently displays the logo of Nebraska Blue Cross, and although
Nebraska Blue cross does in fact handle millions of prescription claims
every day, for the group you belong to, the claim should go to a company
called Caremark, whose logo is nowhere on the card.
The phone rings.
A lady comes to the
counter wanting to know why the cherry flavored antacid works better than
the lemon cream flavored antacid. What probably happened is that she had a
milder case of heartburn when she
took the cherry flavored brand, as they both use the exact same ingredient
in the same strength. She will not be satisfied though until I confirm her
belief that the cherry flavored brand is the superior product. I file your
claim with Caremark, who rejects it because you had a 30 day supply of
Vicodin filled 15 days ago at another pharmacy. You swear to me on your
mother's'....
The phone rings.
........life that you did not have a Vicodin prescription
filled recently. I call Caremark and am immediately placed on hold. The
most beautiful woman on the planet walks buy and notices not a thing. She
has never talked to a pharmacist and never will. Upon reaching a human at
Caremark, I am informed that the Vicodin prescription was indeed filled at
another of my competitors. When I tell you this, you say you got
hydrocodone there, not Vicodin. Another little part of me dies.
The phone rings.
It turns out that a few days after your doctor wrote your last prescription,
he told you to take it more frequently, meaning that what Caremark thought
was a 30-day supply is indeed a 15 day supply with the new instructions. I
call your doctor's office to confirm this and am immediately placed on
hold. I call Caremark to get an override and am immediately placed on
hold. My laser printer has a paper jam.
It's time for my tech to go to lunch. Caremark issues the override and your
claim goes though. Your insurance saves you 85 cents off the regular price
of the prescription.
The phone rings.
At the cash register you sign....
The phone rings.
.......the acknowledgement that you received a copy of my HIPPA policy and
that I offered the required OBRA counseling for new prescriptions. You
remark that you're glad that your last pharmacist told you you
shouldn't take over the counter Tylenol along with the Vicodin, and that the
acetaminophen you're taking instead seems to be working pretty well. I
break the news to you that Tylenol is simply a brand name for acetaminophen
and you don't believe me. You fumble around for 2 minutes looking for your
checkbook and spend another 2 minutes making out a check for four dollars
and sixty seven cents. You ask why the tablets look different than those
you got at the other pharmacy. I explain that they are from a different
manufacturer.
Tomorrow you'll be back to tell me they don't work as well.
Now imagine this wasn't you at all, but the person who dropped off their
prescription three people ahead of you, and you'll start to have an idea
why.....your prescription takes so damn long to fill.
A year and a half late, but a promise kept. I feel better about myself
already.
I Realize Today I've Done You A Disservice
WARNING: This post may be painful for those in the profession to read.
For over a year and a half now, the first thing anyone visiting my little
blog garden has seen under the headline at the top of the page is the
promise that the question of "why does my prescription take so
damn long to fill" will be answered. Tonight I looked over this blogs
archives and realized it was a promise not kept. While many topics have
been covered here, and you have been provided with ample evidence
of how drugstore workday life does indeed warp the mind, the question of why
it took 2 hours for you to get 20 Vicodin has
remained unanswered. I can't help but to think there may be someone out
there who has been logging on every day for the last 18 months hoping in
vain for this mystery to be solved. Should such a person exist, I offer my
humble apologies. To everyone else, I offer the following prescription
scenario:
You come to the counter. I am on the phone with a drunk dude who wants the
phone number to the grocery s tore next door. After I instruct him on the
virtues of 411, you tell me your doctor was to phone in your
prescription to me Your doctor hasn't, and you're unwilling to wait until he
does Being in a generous mood, I call your doctors office and am put on hold
for 5 minutes, then informed that your prescription was phoned in to my
competitor on the other side of town. Phoning the competitor, I am
immediately put on hold for 5 minutes before
speaking to a clerk, who puts me back on hold to wait for the pharmacist.
Your prescription is then transferred to me, and now I have to get the 2
phone calls that have been put on hold while this was being done. Now I
return to the counter to ask if we've ever filled prescriptions for you
before. For some reason, you think that "for you" means "for your cousin"
and you answer my question with a "yes", whereupon I go the computer and see
you are not on file.
The phone rings.
You have left to do something very important, such as browse through the
monster truck magazines, and do not hear the three PA announcements
requesting that you return to the pharmacy. You return eventually,
expecting to pick up the finished prescription.....
The phone rings.
.......only to find out that I need to ask your address, phone number, date
of birth, if you have any allergies and insurance coverage. You tell me
you're allergic to codeine. Since the prescription is for Vicodin I ask you
what exactly codeine did to you when you took it. You say it made your
stomach hurt and I roll my eyes and write down "no known allergies" You tell
me......
The phone rings.
......you have insurance and spend the next 5 minutes looking for your
card. You give up and expect me to be able to file your claim anyway. I
call my competitor and am immediately put on hold. Upon reaching a
human, I ask them what insurance they have on file for you. I get the
information and file your claim, which is rejected because you changed jobs
6 months ago. An asshole barges his way to the counter to ask
where the bread is.
The phone rings.
I inform you that the insurance the other pharmacy has on file for you isn't
working. You produce a card in under 10 seconds that you seemed to be
unable to find before. What you were really doing was hoping
your old insurance would still work because it had a lower copay. Your new
card prominently displays the logo of Nebraska Blue Cross, and although
Nebraska Blue cross does in fact handle millions of prescription claims
every day, for the group you belong to, the claim should go to a company
called Caremark, whose logo is nowhere on the card.
The phone rings.
A lady comes to the
counter wanting to know why the cherry flavored antacid works better than
the lemon cream flavored antacid. What probably happened is that she had a
milder case of heartburn when she
took the cherry flavored brand, as they both use the exact same ingredient
in the same strength. She will not be satisfied though until I confirm her
belief that the cherry flavored brand is the superior product. I file your
claim with Caremark, who rejects it because you had a 30 day supply of
Vicodin filled 15 days ago at another pharmacy. You swear to me on your
mother's'....
The phone rings.
........life that you did not have a Vicodin prescription
filled recently. I call Caremark and am immediately placed on hold. The
most beautiful woman on the planet walks buy and notices not a thing. She
has never talked to a pharmacist and never will. Upon reaching a human at
Caremark, I am informed that the Vicodin prescription was indeed filled at
another of my competitors. When I tell you this, you say you got
hydrocodone there, not Vicodin. Another little part of me dies.
The phone rings.
It turns out that a few days after your doctor wrote your last prescription,
he told you to take it more frequently, meaning that what Caremark thought
was a 30-day supply is indeed a 15 day supply with the new instructions. I
call your doctor's office to confirm this and am immediately placed on
hold. I call Caremark to get an override and am immediately placed on
hold. My laser printer has a paper jam.
It's time for my tech to go to lunch. Caremark issues the override and your
claim goes though. Your insurance saves you 85 cents off the regular price
of the prescription.
The phone rings.
At the cash register you sign....
The phone rings.
.......the acknowledgement that you received a copy of my HIPPA policy and
that I offered the required OBRA counseling for new prescriptions. You
remark that you're glad that your last pharmacist told you you
shouldn't take over the counter Tylenol along with the Vicodin, and that the
acetaminophen you're taking instead seems to be working pretty well. I
break the news to you that Tylenol is simply a brand name for acetaminophen
and you don't believe me. You fumble around for 2 minutes looking for your
checkbook and spend another 2 minutes making out a check for four dollars
and sixty seven cents. You ask why the tablets look different than those
you got at the other pharmacy. I explain that they are from a different
manufacturer.
Tomorrow you'll be back to tell me they don't work as well.
Now imagine this wasn't you at all, but the person who dropped off their
prescription three people ahead of you, and you'll start to have an idea
why.....your prescription takes so damn long to fill.
A year and a half late, but a promise kept. I feel better about myself
already.