Um … how else would we get them?
One thing I’ve noted from the SDMB that I’ve mentioned in previous threads: the continual concern/angst about one’s credit score/rating.
blister packs
Nope. I had heard *of *these things before joining the SDMB, but I assumed it was hyperbole. I had never been to the US before about 10 years ago (around when I started reading here), and every American I had ever met seemed pretty much just like most Canadians. In retrospect I think I just never encountered a conservative, religious-right type and I assumed that their existence was blown out of proportion by TV shows and news. It wasn’t until I joined here that I found out that there really are Americans who carry a gun *everywhere *and consider it a big deal to have that right, for example.
Yeah, if you ask to be directed to the washroom in the US you’ll often be met with a blank stare. It is kind of silly - it sounds like you’re going to have a bath in there or something. But so does ‘bathroom’ I guess. And ‘restroom’ sounds like you might lie down and have a nap. There really is no non-euphemistic term for the place.
In the rest of the world, medication comes in childproof packaging too… but it’s not counted by the pharmacist. The blisters or bottles never, ever, get opened before used by the patient (or their caretaker).
You believe you’re the only ones who think of the children? The only ones who’ve ever heard the expression “safety feature”? Really? :rolleyes:
Sometimes I think we fart at each other more then we talk. Either way, it’s productive.
Geoducks - pronunciation “gooeyducks” and their erm… phallic appearance. Thanks Straight Dope
Is that really what you got from her post? Take a (pharmacist-provided, non-blister pack) chill pill.
And I used to have to pass off the blister pack to my ex roomies 8 year old kid to peel a dose out when my brain was misfiring and I could neither see straight nor coordinate my hands. [wicked bad migraines to the point of vomiting.]
Loose pack pills are more prevalent here because the bean counters in the insurance companies want to make sure they limit access to medication. They want the doc to prescribe the absolute minimum number of pills possible.
I personally wouldn’t mind blister pack, I got to where unless it was a humidity control issue I was peeling anything out and putting them into pill keepers a week or two ahead of time whenever I got given blisterpacks. The one BP med that was blisterpacked for humidity control came where you could subdivide the packs into 1 pill blisters.
Which has got nothing to do with child-proofing. In general, the American system puts more power/relies more on the “pros” (in quotes because often they aren’t particularly qualified) than on the patient; other places rely more on the patient.
And all pharmacists aren’t white knights. Some purposefully short-count pills.
The rise of blister packs has something to do with wasting drugs too, by the way. If you, for instance, nurse someone with an illness, to their death, you’ll be buried under drugs. Medications will be changed swiftly, tried and discarded in the weeks leading up to the end.
We are talking about expensive drugs that never got used, and CANNOT be reused out of fear they may be contaminated. So you end up destroying, perfectly useful, already paid for, drugs that, somewhere in the world, someone else is screaming for! More pills than you imagine, I promise.
Blister packs change that. Drugs in blister packs CAN be recycled to 3rd world countries, where they are often desperately needed, without fear of contamination.
I do realize they can be an annoyance to some, and just wanted to point out there is an upside, too.
Ummm… If they want to lose their license as a pharmacist (and it doesn’t take much-- they’re very strict. A friend of mine snuck a few pills out for herself over the course of a week, got a visit from The Men In White and within two days was not a pharmacist – ever again, I believe).
But they sure do limit pills here in the States. You have to plead and get a note from the prescribing doctor to get more than 30 days’ worth of most meds.
That’s your insurance company , your doctor or the prescription is for something you wouldn’t normally take for 30 days. My husband and I get 90 days worth of prescription medication all the time.The insurance company will only pay for 90 days at a time. The doctor will write the prescription to allow refills for six months or a year.
I’ve never had a co-worker ask me religion. But if one did my reaction would be a lot closer to “oh, you’re one of those” than to “I am surprised at your conduct, because it is in conflict with the cultural values I assumed we shared.”
You learn a lot more about America – or anywhere – from what people take for granted, as normal, than from what they explicitly say.
Columbus Day= Italian American heritage celebration. I had no clue but probably because I call that day Thanksgiving.
Again, the fact that anyone you work with would care where or if you go to church. Thirty years ago or more, it might have made a difference between Protestants and Catholics in Ontario, especially with the school system but other than that…
As an American from Detroit, Michigan (and who has traveled to many diverse places in the US, currently posting from San Francisco on business), I’m finding this thread equally bizarre, amusing, and unsettling.
Remember, this board is comprised largely of opinionated, vocal, liberal/progressive Americans. There’s a huge, diffuse middle ground out there, so you’re sort of parsing a lot of the collateral hyperbole.
Besides some really strange political/religious times and yes, some very poor gang-ridden patches in some ghettos—in reality, I can’t imagine anything more than a few odd, but minor culture-shocks.
Anyhow, continue away, it’s sort of interesting…
NO. I was just explaining why the bottles exist. Medication is counted because it comes in bulk and different patients get different dosing and different refill schedules. They need the pharm or pharm tech to count and make sure the right amount, dose, and type are dispensed to the correct patient.
I like this list better. You may not have previously learned this from the SDMB, but now you have!
Still confused. How do they get the right number of pills? Do they cut off the extra? What happens to those?