Slow Day, Part I

Craziness at the pharmacy today.

It was a very, very slow day today, I read about 50 pages from my book in my four hour shift, and I made 480 grams of Kay-Med 1% HC (I was working in the pharmacy that's in a children's clinic that just so happens to be owned by the same dude that owns the pharmacy I usually work in), all of this should say something to the average person who works in pharmacy. It was f-u-c-k-i-n-g slow.

However, we did not lack in the crazy people department of the day. The first lady, a patient, was not only ignorant but willfully ignorant, a trait that someone such as myself cannot stand.

She came in with an albuterol inhaler. She wanted a refill for her son, we're going to call her Bitcherson from now on. Alright, no problem. Wait, shit, she got this prescription at a pharmacy called ShittyService Clinic pharmacy. While our pharmacy is located in a ShittyService Clinic, it is not a ShittyService Clinic pharmacy. I explain to her that I'll have to call the ShittyService Clinic pharmacy to get a copy, because we are not affiliated with ShittyService, our owner just leases the property from them. She doesn't understand this and doesn't care, she just says "Fill the prescription."

"Ok, will do," I reply, "it will just take a little longer than usual, that's all."

"You seem inexperienced, I've never been told this at any pharmacy before," retorted Bitcherson.

"Well, since you did not get this prescription from this pharmacy, we're going to have to call the pharmacy you did get this prescription from and get all the information from them so we can fill it here," I tried to explain to her. She didn't get it, she didn't care. Her response? "Just fill it."

Ok, so I call ShittyService Clinic pharmacy (ok, it's not the pharmacy that's shitty, it the clinic, I have the tiniest bit of a grudge against them, but that's a story for later) and lo and behold, my friend picks up the phone.

"ShittyService Pharmacy, this is Max," says Max.

"Max! It's PDS over at PDS Pharmacy, I need a copy, fucker," I exclaim (soft enough on the 'fucker' to not be heard by the patient, the pharmacist, however, bursts out laughing). I give him the number blah blah blah.

"Ok, so you're looking at the inhaler right now?" asks Max. I tell him yes.

"Alright, I'll just give you the dates then, last filled 5-19-09 (alarms start ringing in my head, insurance is not gonna cover this) and original 5-19-08," Max states.

"Wait, 08 or 09?" I ask, cause I've already assumed it was 09, and had written that down, I needed to confirm.

"Oh shit, it's 08, so I guess it's expired," says Max.

"Yeah," I say, "Looks like she's trying to get her money's worth from the PRN refills huh?"

"Uh, I guess so?" questions Max. He's new to the pharmacy industry, he has yet to realize that people are generally trying to take advantage. He will learn, and I'm almost sad that he will. I learned, but I hated people before I started pharmacy. He didn't. Pharmacy will change him.

"Yeah, well nice talking to ya, see ya Saturday," I state (I'm seriously running out of ways to say 'say'). Then I hang up without waiting for him to say his little sign-off. Why? Because I don't care.

We explain to the woman that the script is expired and we can't refill it. Her response? "Yeah, I knew it was."

AHHHHHH Go. Fuck. Your. Self!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! You made me call and try to jump threw/through/thru (I don't know which is the correct one at the moment) hoops even though you knew you last filled it on the last eligible date and still tried to fill it in my pharmacy?!??! How fucking stupid do you think I am? Fuck you Bitcherson. Never come back here again.

She left angry because I didn't know what I was talking about, after all, I was 'inexperienced.' What a cunt.

And why was she angry? Because she refused to listen to me or the pharmacist when we both tried to explain to her that we need to call the other pharmacy to get the prescription so we can fill it. We tried to explain to her the whole idea that one cannot bring a bottle or inhaler around and expect every pharmacy to magically fill every prescription. I don't believe that Bitcherson was stupid, I believe that she didn't want to know. That is worse, in my opinion. Willful ignorance is always worse than ignorance.