Sometimes you just know right from the very beginning how the day will go...
I opened the door, turned off the alarm, and saw the mess left over from the night before. Scripts from the previous day weren't filed. Prescriptions were strewn about the counter half filled with little post-it notes on them that didn't do a good job of explaining their half finished state. A bottle of Percocet was left on the counter instead of being put back into the safe. Upon seeing this mess, I knew the day's fate was sealed.
No, a floater didn't work the previous night. If that were the case, the mess would have at least been understandable (though not less infuriating). One of our regular, full-time pharmacists closed the store... or at least I thought.
Thirty minutes after the gate went up, the pharmacy manager called me. Apparently, the day before was a disaster. Our lead tech called out sick... again (she's just about used up all her sick time for the year already, and we're barely into March). The staff pharmacist who was supposed to close went home sick at 2:00, which left the pharmacy manager to work the entire afternoon until close by himself. He also informed me that we didn't get our order yesterday because that same pharmacist who left sick forgot to send the order the night before, which would be forgiveable if she didn't manage to do this at least once a month. Therefore, our order today was going to be twice as large as normal.
Great, I thought. What a lovely day it will be!
The first customer of the day paid for his prescription in pennies. He didn't ask if it was ok. The tech told him the price, and he proceeded to dump a whole pile of pennies on the counter. I wanted to refuse them, but my company's new hassle free policy forced me to smile as both he and the tech tried to count the pennies at the same time, both interrupting each other's counting numerous times.
Just as things were starting to look bleek, a tiny sliver of light shined upon the pharmacy when the lead tech miraculously showed up for work. She had been out since Friday, but she decided to give it the good old college try. By college try, I mean she came to work, did nothing but complain for 2 hours, and then left feeling sick. She had been out all week because of bronchitis, but that wasn't why she left today. In fact, I don't think I heard her cough one time the entire time she was there. Nope, today she left because she thought she had bruised ribs, and simultaneously (and unrelated to the ribs) she felt like she was going to puke.
Later in the morning, a woman on crutches after surgery dropped off a prescription for Percocet. Nothing at all unusual. The script was pefectly legible. No crossouts. No erasures. No mistakes. Beautiful... except for on the line that says "physician print name here," the doctor scribbled down something that had no discernible letters in it. I don't even have to mention that the script was written at a not-so-nearby hospital. I called the hospital to see if anyone could provide me some information that might lead to the identification of the mystery doctor, but I was transferred to a voice mail box. It took me 30 minutes to find someone that could tell me who wrote the script.
And now I will offer my unedited feelings about this doctor and every doctor who can't write neatly. FUCK YOU!! FUCK YOU ALL!! How fucking hard is it to write your name??? You went to medical school. You passed your boards. You have to have some sort of intelligence. Therefore, it completely mystifies me why you would write everything else neatly on the script and then scribble in the spot you're supposed to print your name. You saved yourself all of 1 second, and you wasted 30 fucking minutes of my time. I think this should be punishable by death, or at the very least, a good thorough ass kicking. Go fuck yourself.
Two hours later, a customer who could barely walk shuffled his way up to the counter using a walker. He too presented a Percocet prescription. His numb nuts doctor didn't write a strength on it. I suppose I could have called the office, got the strength (everyone knows it was supposed to be 5/325), and had them mail me a new hard copy. However, I'm sick of fixing everyone else's fuck ups. Therefore, I sent the barely mobile patient back to the office to have his doctor rewrite it. The idea is for him to be mad at his doctor for screwing up. Instead, I'm pretty sure he was just pissed off at me.
Then there was the lady who spent 10 minutes at the counter demanding to know why the price of her prescription increased the exhorbitant amount of $0.99. Highway robbery she proclaimed! I wanted to tell her that she could of borrowed the $0.99 from the guy who dumped the pennies on the counter earlier. I think they would have made a great pair.
The last asshole of the day was a guy who demanded that we transfer all his prescriptions to another pharmacy because his flexible spending account card was rejecting. He didn't have time to call the customer service number to find out why it wasn't working. He just knew it was our fault, and it would work just fine at the pharmacy next door. I wanted to send him to the other pharmacy so bad, but two things held me back. One, the new, unjaded pharmacist who was working with me quickly jumped to his aid and called the customer service line for him. Two, if I transferred the prescriptions I wouldn't get the satisfaction of seeing his face when his card rejected again.
If I was Drug Monkey, I'd be overindulging in scotch right now. However, I'm not that classy, and I've stopped drinking entirely for the time being. Therefore, I'm forced to drown my sorrows in water and Thin Mint Girl Scout Cookies. I'm actually not sure if that's any better for you than scotch.
The best part: I get to do it all over again tomorrow. I LOVE MY JOB!
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6 comments:
Sorry Mike, I just had a similarly terrible day at work this past Tuesday. And like you, I knew the minute I opened the gate (actually before I even opened it) that it was going to be one of those days. The only major difference I noticed between our two experiences was instead of having the penny guy like you did I had the people that insist on coming in at 8:05 AM to a pharmacy that opens at 8AM and wanted to pick up their $4 medication and pay cash for it, with a $100 bill. That actually happened three times that day among all sorts of other issues. And the worst part, I had neither a bottle of good scotch nor a box of Thin Mints to drown my sorrows when I finally got home after my 13 hour shift. But a good cold beer does wonders after a truely terrible day at work.
'They' say it's the little things...
I hate it when patients blame me, personally, for flex card shenanigans. My favorite quote: "You're just not billing it properly!" My response: "I don't know how I can mess up swiping a credit card, so I don't think that's the case."
Shit, what is the karma here? I came to work in the same mess! stuff left over, bottles empty, labels empty, floor a mess. then a note from the pharmacist that said he was there for 2 hours after closing....doing what I wonder...
been a bad week i guess, been awful here and i've noticed i'm being really cynical to boot. Let me just say this, the guy with the pennies, i'll take em'. I own an independent and my welfare patients are always wanting to charge their 2.00 copays until the 3rd, its like pulling teeth (wait they like that gets em the VICs) to get 2 buck out of them after the 3rd of the month...however there is a small shop across the stree that sells cigs and beer, they are in and out of there all day.
your comment about how doctors write prescriptions was spot on. I nearly died laughing. as for the pharmacy experience, do what i do. turn off your mind and think about your techs who are in the same environment getting paid pennies.
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