re: Pharmacies and the long wait... what am I missing?

So pharmacist here... A great example of why it takes so long... I get a script for a child from the ER for augmentin.. The dose looked high and my gut told me it wasn't right. So I've gotta call and see what's what... Hold for a doctor and verify and he said "oh wow yeah that's way wrong, good catch." And we change the dose. So while trying not to OD and make some 4 year old violently ill....

Other customers are coming in and it essentially bogs down with me while trying to make sure I take care of this child's health. So someone is going to have to wait and be a tad inconvenienced...I would hope you people complaining would be ok for other people to wait if the roles were reversed and I was looking out for your child .

Because everyone is on drugs. CVS keeps their costs down by over loading their employees. They usually need more help in the pharmacy but do not want to hire enough staff. Its a nationwide policy.

I have pissed enough of their technicians off bc I wait for 20 minutes for a script and then they tell me that I need a prior authorization. Or you have a situation where I know I have refills on a prescription and the woman looking at her computer screen says that I don't. I call the pharmacist over to the computer screen and SHE finds that I am correct and that I do indeed have refills. This usually wastes about 6 or 7 minutes of my time.

I have to take an Ativan just to calm myself down to go to the CVS.

I'm a pharmacist.

If this happens to you a lot you are probably going to an overwhelmed and understaffed pharmacy.

My patients usually wait 5 - 30 minutes for a new prescription depending on what else is going on. Just choose a better, maybe smaller pharmacy. Grocery chains and independents are more likely to have helpful, experienced, efficient cheerful pharmacists/staff who really care about you.

My job is nothing like the pharmacies you all are complaining about. If someone has to wait longer than 15 minutes because we are very busy they are usually understanding because they are our loyal customers and we spoil them with great service.

Every now and then, random jerks whine about waiting. I tell them "I want to be fast but I need to take my time. We are helping others too and don't want to make fatal errors." That usually shuts them up.

By 2023 most pharmacies will have switched to the new robo-pharmacist and your worries will be a thing of the past.

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So pharmacist here.

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Question. Why not pre-bottle the majority of your stock? You know certain things are going to be #10 #30 #60 #90 4oz 6oz 8oz etc. you can still keep inventory. Seal it up after pre-bottling/packaging to make it tamper-proof.

I can't make sense of the differences in drug prices. Everything from me is of course OOP and its the same for any Rx I write. For some drugs the difference between me and a pharmacy is 5-10x. It seems to be the same drugs almost every time. Never figured out what I'm missing.

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They need machines to replace pharmacists.

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That's already in the works. We will see them before 2023 (as another predicted). Last year MSN had an article on automated technology and the job fields these technologies will replace (or dwindle down significantly) and pharmacists were in the top 5.

Primary care physicians were side listed as being remote (Skype) for non emergency illnesses. And they will find a way to legislate around any legal issues most certainly.

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funny story... we almost went in on that pharmacy when he opened down there... Raceland is my hometown, so i figured i knew enough about the place to know not to do it... don't know how well he's doing to know if we missed out or not...

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You missed out, he's doing great.