A Squiggle’s Logic

I have come to a realization, after one week of training, that my employer is a bunch of phonies. Sure, the people there are super friendly. It’s the corporate system that sucks ass.

Remember this post I’ve made a few months back? Well, lucky for me, I’ll be working with the same exact system for the rest of my life, or at least until I’m fed up with it. For a company that prides itself in innovation and technological advancement, it sure doesn’t give a damn about pharmacy.

To make things worst, everything you do is being scored, from the number of times you input the sig code as free form to the number of credit returns. Hell, they probably score me on the number of times I didn’t kiss a customer’s ass.

The bad thing is I can’t walk away. Of all the graduates in the state, they only hired 4. And I am not gonna give up my position that easily. Oh well, maybe it’ll get better with time.

The Break

Took a few days off from being lazy to be lazier! Our initial plan to visit the Lone Star State was ruined by a family with shits for brain. Nonetheless, I was still able to spend a few days with her to relax and get fat. As unbecoming of me, a squiggle, as this may sound, I have my vacation all planned out. Baptism this week, bachelor party next week, H-town middle of April, Destin, and all leading up to Vietnam!

The Misfill

Last day of rotation was quite perfect, besides a little misfill. Coumadin 3mg was entered as 5mg, and the pharmacist signed off on it. Thankfully I wasn’t the one who keyed it or filled it. Unthankfully, I should have been the one who keyed it and filled it. I saw the script, pulled the right drug, prepared to count the tablets, but had to inform a junkie that no, she can’t just read me the Vicodin script over the phone, I actually need the hard copy. Apparently, the tech didn’t care for my 3mg bottle and entered the 5mg. Another tech filled it. By the time I hung up the phone, the damage was done. It sucked even more that the misfill was noticed not by the patient but by the doctor.

“Hi, this is B from Dr. M’s office. We ordered warfarin 3mg, but it was filled for 5 mg. Are you the pharmacist?”
“Uh no ma’am, not for this I’m not.”

While the pharmacist was apologizing her way out of trouble, I was singing “it’s too late to apologize, it’s too late.” At times like these, I’m glad to concede my $50 something an hour and be a free labor intern.

The Compliment

As the day wrapped up, a mustached woman (yes, full grown, visible from 10 feet away mustache) asked me to recommend an OTC product. I simply wanted her symptoms but instead got her whole life history. After a million blahs, to which I pretentiously nodded while staring at her mustache, she finally told me her symptoms. I recommended a product. A few million blahs followed. She thanked me wholeheartedly and said “you’re going to be a great pharmacist.” Perhaps it was the sincerity in her eyes or the gratitude in her tone, but those words alone obliterated all my insecurities as an intern and gave me the confidence to practice on my own as a pharmacist. As she walked away, I felt a profound sense of accomplishment, a feeling one rarely gets in a hospital setting.

I can’t ask for a more perfect ending.

This month’s rotation really got my ingenious mind working. I don’t mean the fact that I have to know all the brand names for every generic just to locate the drugs, or the fact that I have to push F4 instead of ENTER after inputing a patient’s name (because pushing ENTER to enter just makes way too much sense for the dumb asses who developed the system).

My mind gets a workout because each morning I must contrive a nifty little mind game to keep myself sane. What else can I possibly do with 2 pharmacists, 5 techs, 8 hours, and only 190 scripts besides picking my nose and scratching my ass?

So this morning, I decided to count by 5’s, backwards. 30, 25, 20….5 tablets of HCTZ. That carried me through 4 scripts until my fascinating mind started counting backwards and forwards simultaneously. 30, 5, 25, 10, 20, 15 Nexium capsules. Too easy. I needed a bigger challenge.

That’s when, at time 10:23 am of date Thursday, March 27, 2008, The Perfect Pour was born.

It wasn’t until my 6th pursuit that I attained perfection. The script called for 30 metoprolol tablets. With wrist steady as rock and light as feather, I poured out precisely 30 tablets. The feeling was so elating that I thought I had a mind orgasm. Next up, 14 tablets of Cipro. Again, exactly 14 tablets were poured on my blue Protonix counting tray. Back to back perfection.

Can I three-peat? As I started to pull the next script, Mr. SpongeBob (that’s not really his name) approached the window, whispering for us to fill one of his Viagra. I poured out one tablet, and my 3 consecutive perfect pours delivered the best mind orgasm of mankind, the same orgasm Mr. SpongeBob will experience in an hour.

Unfortunately, my attempt at regaining perfection failed for the rest of the day.

A new tech came in around late afternoon. It was her first day. Apparently, someone forgot to teach her the basics because she was counting by 3’s. Hmm, counting by 3’s. Tomorrow’s game should be interesting.

So they gave me an ID and password at work. That means I actually have to learn their crappy DOS system that was developed by neantherthals a few million years ago along with the invention of the wheel. Everytime I’m on it, I feel like I should be riding horse carriages to work and speak in Old English. “Good den, my lord. What be thy birthdate? Dost generics suit thee? Most splendid!” “Sir Williams, methinks ye hath no refills. Very well, I shall summon thy physician at once.”

Perhaps it was God’s intervention to save me from my DOS torment when the entire store plunged into darkness due to a power outage. Even the backup generator failed. I got to go home 30 minutes early as a result. Yes, it takes a power outage for them to let me go half an hour early. It’s gonna take a category 5 hurricane for them to let me to go an hour early and an apocalypse for them to let me off a whole day.

So I’ll be praying for the end of the world this week.

Twenty more to go. First day wasn’t as bad as I had expected. Script volume was low, only about 260 by 5 pm. Apparently, this was unusually high for them. They were overstaffed with 5 techs and 2 pharmacists. I didn’t think such a thing exists in retail pharmacy. Their DOS system sucks ass. To make things worse, they shelve their drugs according to brands. So HCTZ tablets were under “M,” and its capsules were under “H.” Diltiazem tablets were under “C,” the ER formulations were under “D,” while the 240 mg bottles were under “T.” It took me over half an hour to find a fucking drug. I guess the idiots who developed the system decided that dealing with angry customers, insurance rejections, and prior authorizations isn’t enough. Let’s scatter the drugs around so it takes them 3 months to know where they are. Stupid! I need booze!