The Prescription

A nice, calm and respectable lady went into the pharmacy, walked up to the pharmacist, looked straight into his eyes, and said, ‘I would like to buy some cyanide.’ The pharmacist asked, ‘Why in the world do you need cyanide?’ The lady replied, ‘I need it to poison my husband.’ The pharmacist’s eyes got big and he exclaimed, ‘Lord have mercy! I can’t give you cyanide to kill your husband. That’s against the law! I’ll lose my license! They’ll throw both of us in jail! All kinds of bad things will happen. Absolutely not! You CANNOT have any cyanide!’ The lady reached into her purse and pulled out a picture of her husband in bed with the pharmacist’s wife. The pharmacist looked at the picture and replied, ‘Well now, that’s different. You didn’t tell me you had a prescription.

Not yet available

I supply the full range of available medications but regret some drugs of choice are as yet unknown. 1. The politeness pill – for those who accept their prescriptions in silence without any thank you. 2. The modern manners medication – for those so busy on their mobiles they pay no heed when I call their names. 3. Memory tablets – especially for those who want me to lend them the medicines they have forgotten to order in time on their repeat prescriptions. 4. Patience pills – for me dealing with unreasonable demands such as from those who expect me to rush their prescription because they have a taxi waiting or a meter running out . 5. Fish food – for those who think they are the only fish in the sea and having a prescription for  only one medicine should be served before those already waiting. 6. Logic lumps – for those who think that their two hour wait at the doctors requires them to get medicines now now from me with no waiting at all. Two more which could make my fortune. 5. Instant anti-depressant. One that does not take weeks to kick in. 6. Alcohol substitute – all the  pleasant euphoric effects without the bad side effects.

Knee Jerk

In recent years governments of both stripes have indulged in knee jerk over-reaction to one off tragedies. The stupid Conservatives banned all handguns except for the police after Dunblane, an incident which would never have happened if the then gun laws had been properly enforced. Now our Olympic pistol shooters, if we have any left, have to shoot in France. After Soham where a known sex offender was made a school caretaker, we lost the presumption of innocence. Now we are all paedophiles unless the police check us out. To work with children you need a CRB check.So true to form, after Shipman the serial killing  physician, we have to change the legal controls on Controlled drugs. Some of the restrictions on prescription writing have thankfully been removed. But stupidity reigns over the paperwork. One used to have one register with a section for each drug whatever its form. Now every single different form has to have a separate section. We now have to record if the recipient has proved their identity and how. So someone known to me for years whose identity I am not going to now check, is to be marked as as far as proof of identity is concerned.When revision was mooted and guidance issued new registers were produced. Now these once again are to be scrapped for Home Office revised regulations. I am convinced people sit in Whitehall and make up new rules just to justify their own existence at my expense. A cull of jobsworths is badly needed.

Ethnic monitoring

I am so sick of the race relations industry that I am refusing to fill in my ethnicity on questionnaires.  My citizenship is in heaven, certainly not in the EU. My ethnicity is an irrelevance. However this year I might just do an ethnicity survey of my own, namely one never done AFAIK. Who appears before the Statutory Committee, the disciplinary body of my profession?I reckon the proportions are not those of the register of pharmacists.

More devolutionary inequity

The Welsh have already been given free prescriptions. Now the prescription charge is to be abolished in Scotland too. So as per usual, we English we be paying for the freeloading Celts.

Happy then angry

I have not posted for a while. After some heart failure leading to three days in hospital in June I was down for three months. I did not know if I was tired because I was depressed or depressed because I was tired. Chicken and egg situation. The in October I had a new lease of life. The clouds lifted and for three months I have felt better than I have for years.

Yesterday though i was angry. Short of one medicine I owed a customer I asked to borrow from a nearby multiple pharmacy. yes they had some and were willing to let me have some. So I did labels for the customer and sent her off with an owing note to give the pharmacy. They then rand to say they would lend me the medicine but not seeing a prescription, would not dispense, i.e. stick the labels on.  I blew my top. I have been here ten years, done this many times, and never heard such nonsense. Some wet behind the ears newly qualified jobsworth I expect. I had to send one of my staff out in the rain to go and stick on the labels. Now I hear form the local surgery that they have had patients complaining about this jobsworth pharmacist.

Mistakes

On busy days I and two assistants are dispensing one item a minute. This is pressure work and mistakes do happen. Yesterday a very pleasant man came in saying a locum had given him lacidipine for fluvastatin, brand name lescol, hence I believe the error. He was not bothered but his wife, a difficut woman went on and on about it could have killed him from lowered blood pressure. I aopogised for the error. They left only for their medic son to phone me. I could hear his mother ranting on in the background. I apologised again for the locum’s error. He wanted to know what I would do about it. I said all errors are logged and we seek to learn from them. He wanted to know how he could complain further but declined to do so when I told him it was the local Primary Care Trust of the N.H.S. he had to contact. He said he was concerned it could happen again. I pointed out his father and mother had been coming to me for 10 years with no problems. He went on and on about what might have happened to his father if he had not spotted the error and could not seeem to accept that I could only deal with what had happeneded not what might have happened. I wish the said medic an error free career. In all my years in pharmacy, I thank God I have never made an error which caused any harm.

A Conspiracy Exposed?

My last two letters to my professional journal have been refused for publication as the editor did not like them, saying they were not relevant to the profession. Will the one sent today fare any better? I cannot yet copy it here. It concerns the fact that the N.H.S. Drug Tariff by which pharmacies are paid for listed drugs and appliances, particularly generic drugs, is a very unreal document.
We used to reimbursed with a percentage on the cost of the dispensed items plus a dispensing fee. Some years ago the on cost percentage was scrapped. Apparently our reimbursement was to be for the work only, not with a percentage of the cost price added.

We are paid Drug tariff prices based on what major wholesalers charge. In reality everyone buys from cheaper suppliers and makes considerable profits. Pharmacy proprietors are now shedding tears over reductions in the tariff prices. Personally I welcome a move towards reality. They should be honest and renegotiate their contract properly with real transparency not a deal to pretend they are getting paid fees only, with profits hidden .

Abuse

I am quick with my work. Most people do not have to wait more than five minutes. Yesterday work was interrupted by loud shouts.

“How f…ing long does it take to stick label on one  f…ing medicine? Let me take it to Boots.”

I am told her teenage daughter was on top of her on the floor. They were up when I immediately produced her antidepressant which was ready. I told her that her condition was no excuse for her behavior. Her daughter not pleased. That is one customer I shall be happy to lose.

Treating addicts

I like a drink.  My favorite tipple is single malt. I could easily get addicted. if i did I would not be prescribed free whisky. So why are drug addicts treated differently from alcoholics? Junkies get free methadone and no attempt seems to be made to get them free from addiction unless they want it.  There is no persuading them to get off the habit. Now we hear they are being offered incentives such as antidepressants to stay off other drugs. No-one offers me food to get me off a habit of comfort eating. I feel had done by. No I do not. I am merely angry at our government that will not just say no to addicts.