Preventing Errors and the patient’s responsibility
The USA Today article raised to national attention the mistakes made in pharmacies due to workload issues. Something came to mind today as I was on the phone with yet another dr’s office….What about the mistakes we catch before they are ever filled? No, not the ones we make..the ones OTHERS make but we find and prevent.
How many times have YOU pharmacists out there had to call a Dr’s office when your computer prompt tells you of an allergy? How many times have you had to call back when somebody prescribes a Z-pak for somebody on warfarin? Serotonin syndromes, QT elongation, whatever, these are interactions that are real and day after day, we catch this stuff. Why do we catch this stuff? Because we have the necessary information to prevent these kinds of problems.
Its kind of a long introduction to the point I am trying to get at:
Patients should find a pharmacy and stick with it. The filling of a prescription is not a game, but a certain group of people are treating it like it is.
With the advent of pharmacy coupons and chasing the deal, patients are sacrificing their safety for a gift card. I dont wish harm to anybody, but don’t expect a lot of sympathy from me if it happens.
Sometimes it makes a person wonder why we don’t make people sign disclaimer when they walk in. Patients with multiple dr’s going to multiple pharmacies, taking multiple drugs.
If I was pharmacy King: here’s what I’d have the patient sign: I (insert patient name) assume all responsibility for the prescription I am about to take. I acknowledge that this pharmacy does not posess my entire drug profile, nor does it have my complete list of physicians or disease states. I came here for the gift card (by the way, where is it?), and next month I will fill my rx someplace else for THEIR gift card. I may die taking this medication today but I will die with a purse full of gift cards whom I will leave to my next of kin. WooHoo!
Ok, so its not likely anybody will actually sign anything like this, but wouldn’t it be fun? It seems that the responsible patient is a disappearing component in the filling process. If a customer is going to use 6 pharmacies every month like a game of musical chairs, then he/she is going to assume liability for his/her own monitoring. Its getting stupid out there.
How can we, on one hand, advocate collaboration between doctors to improve patient care, then encourage poly-pharmacy by handing out cash rewards. Its a practice that needs to stop. Already illegal for anybody on Medicare, Medicaid and Tricare/Champus, I wonder how long before other private insurers are going to put the cabosh on using monetary enticements to use their benefits.
I know I dont feel a lot of personal responsibility to these people. They waste my time transferring prescriptions all over town, and when it comes time for counseling, all they want to talk about is gift cards: how many can I get, how can I use them, when can I get another one. etc etc etc. They dont want to hear about side effects. They want to add to their card inventory.
All I can say to these patients is this: don’t expect ME to care when you don’t.
Happy bargain hunting, and good luck, you may need it someday.
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