ladyfoxfyre >> step in please

The BBQ Pit
1

Since my thread was closed and I didn’t have a chance to respond in the way I wanted to respond, I’ll do it here. I actually didn’t read your posts until the thread was closed.

[QUOTE=ladyfoxfyre]
Um, from the pharmacy perspective, no, no, no, no, and no.

If you’d had a prescription filled for vicodin for #12 pills for the purpose of a dental visit, your day supply would have been between 2 and 3, not 30 unless there was an error.

The reason they didn’t fill it is because the insurance alerted them to the fact that you’ve been getting hydrocodone at another pharmacy and it was too soon per the insurance, yes, but if it’s a controlled medication you are still not getting it even if you pay cash for it. As to them not giving the prescription back, I don’t know about the legality of it but if it were me, I would have written the date the prescription was due to be filled in big numbers on the top of the script so you didn’t take it somewhere else to be filled for cash.

I think there’s probably more to this story than you might be letting on. There is really only one way that it would have been something out of your hands, if the person who entered in the ‘dentist visit’ hydrocodone put something larger than necessary in the day supply field and the insurance believes 12 pills is supposed to last 30 days.
Besides the case of deja-vu that this is giving me, I think I’ve heard this same story from another poster here. The EXACT same story, in fact.

This happens to me nearly every day. I catch somebody trying to fill their hydrocodone early, they’re pissed because I make it so they can’t take it to some pharmacy they’ve never been to to pretend like they don’t have insurance and pay cash for it.

You say in your own story that you get the same prescription from the same pain management clinic every month. I’m betting that the issue was not the stuff you got from the dentist’s office, but that you were more than several days too early from the last script you got, and nobody had the stones to tell you so.
I’m withholding judgement until I hear the rest of the story, but considering I encounter people that give me this story and a thousand others every single day, my response is :dubious:

ETA: Also, I think the cries that you were treated unfairly and should complain are utterly ridiculous. I doubt anybody was rude to you, especially considering you were the one making a scene about the issue, and there is probably more here than meets the eye, but we can still pretend like the Pharmacist is the bad guy, right?
[/QUOTE]

I really don’t want to be too rude, but this is the exact mentality that makes you pharmacy people seem rude and holier than thou. You just proved my whole point with all of your posts in this thread

Twice you accused me of lying in what I posted, you judged me once and then you said I was lying again at the end of your post, but you were going to with hold judgement until I post “the real story” ?!?! WTF? lol.

And when you go writing all over people’s prescriptions, you’re not being cute or smart or helping this person.

People NEED their medication and not everybody is a drug addict. Some people take more medication than they are supposed to because they are old, or they forget or hell, maybe their…gasp in pain and need to take a little more than they are prescribed and just haven’t talked to their doctor about getting the meds up’d ! So by saying that you write in BIG LETTERS when it’s supposed to be filled so they don’t go to another pharmacy and try to get it filled there, you’re not doing anybody any favors and you’re just making yourself look like a real jerk.

One day you may suffer from chronic pain and need to have a monthly supply of percocets or whatever. I hope you don’t ever need pain meds, but what I do hope is that, in case you do have to be in my shoes, I hope that you run into another person like you.

Whether I am an opiate addict or not, I am also an admitted chronic pain sufferer, but you neglected to leave those posts out because it doesn’t fit your agenda.

I suffer from two badly damaged discs and I am pretty sure that even though I take pain medication and I am physically addicted to it, that isn’t 100% my fault now, is it? I can’t write prescriptions on my own now, can I? Well, I could, but I doubt they would get very far, not to mention I wouldn’t be sitting here a free man for very long.

What I posted was exactly what happened. I have no reason to lie. I see my doctor every 28-32 days, depending on when the Wednesday falls, because he has different offices and comes to my area on Wednesdays.

They stated that I had some filled three weeks ago at CVS, I told them that I had a dentist prescribe me a small amount of Vicodin and my insurance will only pay for hydrocodone once a month, even if it’s twenty pills or two hundred. I have an MCO with United Healthcare, look into it.

So that being said, please give people the benefit of the doubt sometimes.

2

I’m not in chronic pain, but my father is (Sjogren’s Syndrome). I wish that the assholes who get on their high horses about filling a prescription a day early, or who make the doctors (specialists!) live in fear of losing their license for actually relieving the pain of too many patients, could spend one day in the kind of agony he’s lived with for years. You don’t have to sit there and try to have a normal conversation as he’s gasping with pain because he can’t get any more pills until next Tuesday. :mad:

He may or may not be an addict - how could you tell at this point? He can’t live without the medicine either way, so what the hell difference does it make?

3

And as someone who’s husband was getting Methodone off the street (200 mg/day)

And as someone who got calls every other day for two weeks from different pharmacies in different cities AND counties telling me a script was filled and ready for pick up…(btw, when I called CVS to alert them that they were given a false # and it was the 3rd CVS to call me this week, they blew me off, Walgreens did too when I called them, but at least locked my phone # off the persons account)

And as someone who has had lifetime migraines but has never been given anything stronger than aleve because I might become an addict…

And as someone who believes that pharmacists have no right to refuse RU486

I wish their was a way to tell the truly needy from the addicts. I understand life time pain, even if mine is only about once a week, I would love to believe that we were moving towards better understanding of the long term effects of pain and heck, the effects of pain and the desire to minimize it better than we do now.

I feel sorry for pharmacists, doctors and chronic pain sufferers. I also feel bad for the junkies. I hope the OP isn’t a junkie abusing the system. I hope ladyfoxfyre has at least one day free of dealing with junkies who are abusing the system.

4

You know, ladyfoxfyre, you turned OUT to be right, but I didn’t see any evidence to justify your accusations when you first made them.

It was a little frustrating for my righteous anger that you turned out to be right, really. Darn you.

5

Dude, you’re an addict. You are not thinking rationally.

Please get help. It appears you were trying to in Feb, but here now in June you seem to be off the wagon. It isn’t the pain, it is the addiction talking. (Not to say you aren’t in very real pain). In the earlier Feb Thread, Qadgop the Mercotan was giving you some good advice.

For everyone else- IMH (non medical)Opinion Hydrocodone sucks as a pain reliever. The Tylenol usually included with it shoulders most of the Pain work, IMH (Non- medical) Opinion. Talk it over with your Dr, but when I get prescribed Tylenol with Hydrocodone, I take one only at bedtime (does get most dudes to sleep) for maybe two days. IMH(non-medical)O Hydrocodone is over prescribed. In many cases, taking Ibruprofen *and *Tylenol works better for me than Hydrocodone. But like I said, discuss it with your Dr. Tell him you are concerned about opiate addiction and see what else he can suggest.

6

Ladyfoxfyre was doing her job. I feel bad for your situation. but it’s hardly fair to blame your lack of medication unto her.

7

[QUOTE=DrDeth]
For everyone else- IMH (non medical)Opinion Hydrocodone sucks as a pain reliever. The Tylenol usually included with it shoulders most of the Pain work, IMH (Non- medical) Opinion. Talk it over with your Dr, but when I get prescribed Tylenol with Hydrocodone, I take one only at bedtime (does get most dudes to sleep) for maybe two days. IMH(non-medical)O Hydrocodone is over prescribed. In many cases, taking Ibruprofen *and *Tylenol works better for me than Hydrocodone. But like I said, discuss it with your Dr. Tell him you are concerned about opiate addiction and see what else he can suggest.
[/QUOTE]

I assure you, try a broken bone, four torn ligaments and surgery involving drills and metal pins and you will NOT find the tylenol more useful than the opiate.* (Though, vicodin only helped until the surgery-- then I needed percoset.) Honestly, don’t you think if there were something that worked as well for severe pain as opiates doctors would already prescribe it?

I actually had an awful experience with a bitchy pharmacist over my painkillers. They didn’t want to fill my percoset prescription because I’d had a 20-count vicodin filled 10 days before. Despite the script saying “for post surgical pain”. Despite me standing there on crutches. Despite nearly all my prescriptions coming from the same doctor (the original was from the orthopedic at urgent care-- the rest were all from the surgeon). I can’t possibly be the only person with a changing situation and escalating pain.

She wanted to completely refuse to fill it even when I offered to pay cash. (Originally she blamed it on insurance. It was only after “No worries, my insurance is shitty, I’ll just pay” got a stony stare and furious whispering that I realized they thought I was a junkie." I ended up having to show my medical paperwork (including my MRI results) and beg her to come around and look at my cast.

Got grief when I tried to fill my completely on-narcotic toradol prescription and a later Darvocet prescription (which is what I’m down to now). I think my name is now flagged or something.

I’m angry at the addicts, and I’m also angry at the pharmcists (and doctors) who have let the addicts turn them into assholes.

*I’m already waiting for the poster to come in and announce that they got run over by a semi and took nothing for their shattered bones and ruptured organs but two advil and a nice cup of tea.

8

I had a pharmacist tell me that he couldn’t give me a refill on my birth control any less than thirty days after my last refill.

Think on that for a minute.

I tried to explain to him that it’s meant to be refilled more frequently than every 30 days because it comes in 28 pill packages but you have to take it every day, meaning that you cannot just skip two days and then get the refill, but he refused to be swayed by logic and fact. He told me that 28 pills is all you get for 30 days.

I had to drive 15 miles to another pharmacy to get the prescription transferred. They asked why I was transferring my scrip, and when I told them, the two people at the pharmacy counter looked horrified.

9

Peaceful honest people, in my opinion, should be free to take whatever drug they want whenever they want to take it. The whole prescription scam riles my ass. It makes for higher prices all around, from drugs to doctors. It presumes that pain and need are objective things that a third party can make decisions about. It forces doctors to be responsible for things they can’t control. And it forces patients to endure unnecessary suffering. Fuck! :mad:

10

[QUOTE=Liberal]
And it forces patients to endure unnecessary suffering.
[/QUOTE]
While I agree for the most part, I’d like to add “so does addiction” to your rant.

11

[QUOTE=Obsidian]
I assure you, try a broken bone, four torn ligaments and surgery involving drills and metal pins and you will NOT find the tylenol more useful than the opiate.* (Though, vicodin only helped until the surgery-- then I needed percoset.) Honestly, don’t you think if there were something that worked as well for severe pain as opiates doctors would already prescribe it?
[/QUOTE]

Bah in my day you got a shot of whiskey and a stick to put between your teeth. And we were greatful!

Kids these days…get off my tail!

12

[QUOTE=bigbabysweets2000]
While I agree for the most part, I’d like to add “so does addiction” to your rant.
[/QUOTE]
Addiction sucks. But as I see it, a doctor or pharmacist shouldn’t have to be a nanny. An addict will get his drugs. And there are a lot of people in the pipe who could foil his addiction as well as or better than a doctor. There are also a lot of people willing to feed it. But punishing people in genuine need just to be sure that no addicts get through is ethically and morally unconscionable, as far as I’m concerned.

13

[QUOTE=Obsidian]
*I’m already waiting for the poster to come in and announce that they got run over by a semi and took nothing for their shattered bones and ruptured organs but two advil and a nice cup of tea.
[/QUOTE]
You’ll get an opposite anecdote. On vacation I got a badly infected cavity – when it was finally taken out it was hard to tell it was a tooth – and I must have taken nearly the limit of both Tylenol and aspirin one day and it did nothing. I was sitting in bed in pain and I finally went down and had to write to my dad how much an emergency room visit would cost, as it was nighttime and I had never been to the ER. (And of course, I had to tell the ER intake person what my problem was and they didn’t hear me several times when I was talking :rolleyes: :rolleyes: )

The 5/500 Vicodin they gave me completely healed the pain. Retroactively, it must have been very very bad pain because whenever I take Tylenol it works extremely well, but I stick to aspirin because it’s safer IMO.

14

[QUOTE=diggleblop]
What I posted was exactly what happened. I have no reason to lie. I see my doctor every 28-32 days, depending on when the Wednesday falls, because he has different offices and comes to my area on Wednesdays.

[/QUOTE]

Do you get teeth pulled every six months or something? And after they fucked it up the first time, why wouldn’t you take steps to make sure it wouldn’t happen again?

And just what the hell kind of dentist prescribes Vicodin for a patient that’s already on Lortab? Hell, I’ve seen pharmacists get antsy about filling very low doses of Klonopin for a patient who’s already on an even smaller dose of Xanax. Makes sense - they’re just covering everybody’s ass.

And finally, every single pain management clinic I’ve ever had contact with makes you sign an agreement that you will get your scrips from them filled at one pharmacy, and one pharmacy only. It may be an Ohio and Kentucky thing, but I doubt it.

15

My very conservative, religious Uncle is a pharmacist in a very conservative state, and has been for 30 years. I asked him about RU486 following a discussion here. He said it was none of his business and not his job to make that call. Just sayin’.

16

[QUOTE=fessie]
My very conservative, religious Uncle is a pharmacist in a very conservative state, and has been for 30 years. I asked him about RU486 following a discussion here. He said it was none of his business and not his job to make that call. Just sayin’.
[/QUOTE]

Kudos to your uncle, I wish more people were like him. While I will try to respect the beliefs of others, my respect gets a bit frayed when they try to push those beliefs on me.

As for the OP, paranoia about drug-seeking behavior has gotten very out of hand in my opinion. When my mother in law was in the hospital near death the doctors said “there was nothing they could do” and refused to give her anything for pain. Yeah, dying is really drug-seeking behavior.

Thank the Goddess for Hospice.

17

[QUOTE=Liberal]
Peaceful honest people, in my opinion, should be free to take whatever drug they want whenever they want to take it.
[/QUOTE]

And how exactly do we determine who these people are? Visually?

Susan

18

I feel bad for you, diggle, but I have to say I can’t see how this is the pharmacists fault. They are following the rules, and given the risk of abuse (maybe not yours personally, but in general), they have to draw the line somewhere.

So yeah, they should have informed you more timely that they could not fill it…so that you could call your doctor or health care provider to get a supplementary prescription or whatever if needed. If you feel that your doctor/healthcare provider (or again, others in general) are underprescribing pain meds…that seems to me to warrant another thread/topic. They are the ones who make the call.

I personally agree that the whole system is a bit odd. My wife sprained her ankle (minor) some years ago and was given a script for 30 Vicoden. She needed maybe 3 of them, and ended up tossing the rest.

She’s also going to pharmacy school, and has interned in a retail environment. It seems fradulent scripts are fairly common, and as ladyfoxfyre noted, risky for the retailer as they get blamed when not showing due diligence if something goes bad.

19

[QUOTE=diggleblop]
And when you go writing all over people’s prescriptions, you’re not being cute or smart or helping this person. People NEED their medication and not everybody is a drug addict. Some people take more medication than they are supposed to because they are old, or they forget or hell, maybe their…gasp in pain and need to take a little more than they are prescribed and just haven’t talked to their doctor about getting the meds up’d ! So by saying that you write in BIG LETTERS when it’s supposed to be filled so they don’t go to another pharmacy and try to get it filled there, you’re not doing anybody any favors and you’re just making yourself look like a real jerk.
[/quote]

I agree with the rant to the extent that ladyfoxfyre was taking it upon herself to disbelieve you with no evidence you were being untruthful. But I don’t agree with this part at all.

People should not be taking more medication than they need because they are old or they forget. If that’s an issue, then they need to put themselves on a medication regimen where to prevent it, like those day-of-the-week pill cases some people use. If people feel they need to take more meds than they were prescribed then they need to talk to their doctors about getting their scripts adjusted accordingly. That’s between you and your doctor, not you and the pharmacy. The pharmacy is not supposed to fill scripts before the refill date.

If you are a chronic pain sufferer and you are a relatively young, not terminally ill person, then you probably already know that long-term opiate use is not a great solution for you. It’s not a great solution both because it is addictive and because patients can develop opioid tolerance, leading them to require increasing doses to achieve the same level of pain control. Tolerance and addiction are not at all the same thing, but both present concerns.

It’s not a matter or establishing fault or blame, it’s a matter of treating your pain in an appropriate manner while limiting dependence and tolerance and hopefully avoiding addiction. That’s a fine line to walk, and one you for which you need your doctor’s help. You may believe that on occasion you have good reason to push the envelope on the number of opioids you are legally allowed, but that is not the pharmacist’s fault. Talk to your doctor.

And I should disclose that I’m not healthcare provider; I’m a lawyer. My limited knowledge of this subject comes from defending a case against an opioid-dependent and opioid-tolerant (addicted, IMO) employee who was terminated for stealing pain meds from a medical station and who then sued her employer for wrongful discharge, claiming a disability. I certainly do not defend her actions but I will tell you that chronic pain and over-dependence on opioids had left her at a very low place where she was doing things I’m sure she never dreamed she’d do, like stealing. That is a failure in medical care; her treatment should have addressed both her pain and her dependence issues without leaving her in such a desperate place. Talk to your doctor, and be honest about your situation.

20

The biggest issue here is how the pharmacists reacted… they basically lied to the customer about why they would not fill the script. They said it was because of his insurance, and then initially refused to return his prescription. They had no right to do this, and this is why he should file a complaint.

If they had any question about the validity of the script, they should have called his doctor. The had NO qualifications whatsoever to make a judgment on their own. His DOCTOR prescribed him the meds and he is the one with the medical degree and expertise and authority to prescribe for controlled substances. How can a pharmacist unilaterally negate the doctor’s medical decisions? That is bullshit. The doctor prescribed it, now do your job and fill it.

Also there really is no liability for the pharmacy is they fill a valid prescription. If they think it is counterfeit, then they can verify it. Otherwise, it’s the doctor who would have the liability if anything goes wrong, not the pharmacy. So the the issue of pharmacy liability is just a smokescreen.

diggleblop, yes you are probably an addict but you were still treated rudely and should complain. If your prescription was valid, it should have been filled. Period.