Chickenpox and Implants

Wow, crazy night in the pharmacy. Guess that means it was normal. :-) It started off just like any other shift....lots of hydrocodone going out the door, lots of stupid questions from even more stupid patients who were too lazy to actually come in the pharmacy and instead chose to use Alexander Graham Bells wonderful invention. You know if I could build a time machine I might choose to go back and assassinate that man. Anyway, our pharmacists rotation is set so that one of the two gets the weekend off and they both get one day off during the week, one gets Tuesday morning off and the other gets Wednesday night. Thank God we have a regular fill in pharmacist who is awesome. None of the techs mind working with him at all. Good pharmacist great personality. I myself would rather work with him than our pharmacy manager, so that took some of the sting out of knowing I'd have to close Wed. night and open Thur. morning. So for this blog to keep identities private we'll call this pharmacist Dr. Cookie. Why? Because he ALWAYS buys a half gallon of milk and a dozen cookies when he's at our store. Its his trademark..lol. Ok back to the story.

Things are going along like usual when one of "special" patients shows up for refills. This lady is at least 70, goes to a pain clinic and is nuttier than shelf full of fruitcakes. Nice, but overly talkative and very very into sharing TMI. She is a tiny woman with a close cut hairstyle that changes color more often than Paris Hilton changes clothes, a face with more lines than a pick up artist and voice so deep and scratchy from years of smoking that when she talks you want to scream "COUGH IT UP ALREADY!!" We will call her Lavender Line. I'm sure she'll come up several times so learn that name. So...LL is one of those patients who you ring up and say "Have a nice day" to and she simply steps to the side and begins to rip open her bags like a kid on Christmas morning ripping open packages. She continues to talk to you all the time shes doing this even though you are now waiting on the next person in line. LL just talks over you and interrupts freely as if shes the only person there. Now its very rude to stop and answer her while dealing with another person but if you do not then she'll just get louder. I have found its better to give very apologetic looks to the patient you are speaking with, stop placate her and then continue with your current patient.

So LL is ripping her bags open when it suddenly occurs to her in the middle of her monologue about HMO's and PPO's that her medication was higher than usual. She begins to investigate and discovers one of her generics cost her 44 bucks instead of her LIS Medicare price. She paid for this no questions asked and probably 5 minutes have already gone by since her transaction was completed. Instead of slowing down her diarrhea of the mouth and questioning it like someone who is really worried about money and therefore NEEDS LIS would have done, she pays and now it has to be corrected. It was our mistake and was easily fixed before her transaction was completed but noooooo we have to do it the hard way. Page a manager, wait on them, page them again, wait some more, finally get them and then fill out paper work and re-ring the med all while she runs off at the mouth. Now in the middle of this big old mess she picks up her rant on HMO's again and this time brings it around to her "ex-husband who has that old piece of sh*t H*****h S*****g plan" her words not mine. And how this one was her "second husband not her real one, that ones dead". She then goes on to say out of the blue "I called him and he told me he can't get it up up anymore, but they won't pay for Viagra so hes gonna let them do surgery on him and put something in his dick" At this point my mouth is now hanging open, good thing the flies still aren't prevalent. I'm looking over her shoulder at another patient who can't stop laughing and trying to figure out exactly what I should say to that when she continues. " So I called my daughter and told her about it. I just think its ridiculous. I'm gonna go to the hospital and when he wakes up tell him I'm awful sorry but they made a mistake and gave him a vagina instead. I told her that but she told me not to that I'd give him a heart attack" About the time she got that out she finished the paperwork. I told her to have a nice day and practically ran around the corner before I lost it completely. Dr Cookie had spent about 15 minutes with her before all of this doing patient consultation...he was just beating his head on the counter at this point.

So LL is long gone and its getting right to heart of the afternoon rush. We take a copy from a nearby chain store for Acyclovir 200 suspension. New patient, so Dr Cookie very thoughtfully collects all pertinent info from the other pharmacist...Did I mention hes much loved?? :-)About 20 minutes passes and the patient arrives to pick up the med. Its a mother with a 3 year old...a very noisy, rowdy 3 year old. We're getting behind and there are a couple other patients ahead but we push her to the front because sanity is very important. I went around the corner and quickly poured it up, labeled it and handed it off. He begins to check it as I head back to the station where I am inputting scripts. I hear a frantic whisper "Hey DT?" I look up and Dr Cookie has a very alarmed expression on his face. I raised an eyebrow at him in question. "Does this kid have...(horror has now taken over the muscles of his face) CHICKENPOX?" Me.."I don't know, I'll ask." He finishes verification and I take the completed script to the register and call the name. The mom comes up to pay....the 3 year old has practically climbed every surface in the area by now...all the chairs the counters at drop off and consultation and pick up. As I scan the bar code I casually ask " Do we have a case of chickenpox here?" The mother looking supremely unconcerned replies "That's what her Dr thinks" I look at Dr Cookie and nod. Hes practically in spasms by now at the thought. I finish the transaction and ask him what the problem is. This is how I discover Dr Cookie has never had chickenpox. He began to rant about how inconsiderate the mother was etc..... One thing is for sure, hes SERIOUSLY scared of getting them. I had to go get a bleach solution to wipe down the pharmacy and he STILL wouldn't go near the consultation area again. I know it shouldn't be funny, but a big, strapping, fully grown man being terrified of contracting a child's disease(yes I am aware it can be deadly in adults)was just that. Not the fact that he was frightened but the behavior he presented I guess...anyway..that was my night. I hope tomorrow is less eventful.