"But I got a phone call from your computer" the customer will typically say "I must have something ready"
Just when I thought I couldn't be surprised by the ignorance and/or cavalier attitude people have about the chemicals they are putting in their bodies, came the advent of the autofill. It works like this; you ask your drugstore to have the computer automatically fill your presciptions for a maintenance med (something you'll be taking permanently, like a med for blood pressure, diabetes, etc.) when it's due for a refill. The computer will then call you when it's ready and you can then swing by the store and pick it up, no muss, no fuss. You can even put your credit card on file and it will be automatically paid for. What could be easier?
Here's how it works in the real world. A customer will be at the counter to pick up their prescription. Nothing will be ready. Customer will be adamant that something is here because they received that automated phone call. It might have been a call about someone else in the family. It might have been a call about the prescription they picked up yesterday that went out before it was sold. It might have been a call about someone who had your phone number before you moved to town and got it. These things happen. So I'll ask...."Well it doesn't look like I have anything ready for you, what was it you needed?"
And they will have no idea.....not the slightest clue. All they know is that the computer told them to come to the store and pick up some medicine. (Keep in mind that nothing gets put on autofill unless the customer specifically requests it.) If the computer told them to come into the store and quack like a duck would they do that as well? If I had a lower moral standard I would start calling customers at random, telling them to pick up their meds and have a vial of vitamins or M&M's waiting for them. I would soon be able to retire.........
3 comments:
You're hilarious. It's addictive to read honesty like this. I'm an alternative medicine practitioner, who generally thinks that medicine - or should I say the ideal of "Medicine" - has been screwed up by the corporate pharmaceutical biz, but I'm not an idiot- I take meds, and know they're needed often- your blog points out the vagaries of trying to execute the ideal of medicine in the real world- Can I just ask you an honest question tho? Why do pharmacists have to go to school for so long and why do they think they deserve so much respect when, from a customer's point of view, all they do is put pills in a bottle for you and ring them up? I always decline the consult because I've already read up on the drug mechanisms, the disease's mechanisms, etc.- I'm edumucated. Thanks for your honesty.
B
Thanks for the compliments, I'm looking to get into the subject of Corporate America's infiltration of medicine at some point.
An honest question deserves an honest answer, so here goes. Ready? Your pharmacist is overtrained. When we come out of school, we're at the point where given a diagnosis, we could completely manage a patients drug therapy. From choosing the med to dosing to monitoring for adverse effects. Most of that is forgotten within 2 years. What we really *need* to know is what your med is for, the 2 or 3 most common side effects, and if your liver is going to explode if you take it in combination with what else you've been prescribed. Liver explosions are an exceedingly small percentage of the problems you get day to day at the drugstore, but, the pharmacist is the only person there qualified to give an opinion as to whether one is imminent, which, yes, leads to a large number of pharmcists who have trouble getting their heads through the door on their way to work. If you gave a shot of truth serum to any retail pharmacy district supervisor they would tell you this is becoming an industry wide problem. There is a shortage of pharmacists at the moment, so finding enough to staff your stores is a big problem. Finding one who is actually helpful in meeting the day to day needs of getting presciptions filled and out the door, doing things like *gasp* touching the cash register if necessary, can be almost impossible.
I was just reading your old blogs and this is my stupidest question so far: patient brings up a box of benadryl capsules and a box of benadryl tablets. "What's the difference between these?" I thought it was a trick question. "Um, one's a tablet. One's a capsule." I thought it was pretty self explanatory.
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