Bright Medical Assistants - Part 2

Today we received an electronically transmitted prescription for "ondansetron 4mg OR TBDP". I (and the other pharmacist) didn't know what "TBDP" stood for. Ondansetron (brand Zofran) comes as a regular tablet and as an orally disintegrating tablet, and I thought perhaps the "TBDP" indicated the orally disintegrating version. As I stated before, I don't know everything, so I phoned the doctor's office and was transferred to the medical assistant who transmitted the prescription. When she was asked which form (disintegrating or non-disintegrating) the doctor wanted us to dispense, she replied, "It don't matter." Sounds good to me.

(When I got home, I did a search online, and the "TBDP" was associated with the orally disintegrating tablet. I still don't know what it stands for though. Anybody?)

I thought the unemployment rate was high...

Some medical assistant from a doctor's office phoned today and strongly stated, "I need you to check a medication you filled for a patient because you gave her the wrong thing!" Sometimes I am wrong, so I checked the patient's medication profile. There I saw Synthroid 125 mcg (microgram), so I told the girl on the phone, "It says right here we gave here Synthroid 125 mcg." She exclaimed, "What?!?!? One hundred and twenty-five micrograms? Wow! That's way wrong. That's like a super high dose." I said, "Well, I'm able to pull up the prescription image here, and it clearly states Synthroid 0.125 mg (milligram)." She then said, "Well that's right. So you guys did mess up." As you may well know, there are probably many unemployed people that can convert milligrams to micrograms and back again. I'm not sure how this girl beat those people out in the application process.

I'm Confused

I haven't had many good stories to post lately. Why? I went on a massive vacation. Some exciting things happened in the pharmacy while I was gone, however. One of my technicians got into a yelling match with a crabby old man, and another one of my technicians caught a dumb physician's office receptionist trying to turn in some fraudulent prescriptions. Anyway, more stories will be coming soon, but just to hold ya'll over, I'll share a little something from today.

A woman phoned the pharmacy and after my greeting immediately stated, "Hi, I've never filled at Albertson's before, and I just want to see if I can get it." I responded, "Huh?" She could tell I was confused, so she confused me further by saying, "I'll pick it up later, but can you tell me how many refills I had, and I think maybe I've filled at Albertson's." Naturally I figured she thought she was talking to Albertson's, so I said, "This isn't Albertson's." She said, "Oh, I know. I want to get it there because I live right next to Albertson's and I don't have a car to make it to Walmart until next week." I then said, "Oh, I see. You need to call Albertson's to ask them to call us for a transfer." She said, "They already called you for a transfer. I just want to see how many refills I had." She gave me the name of the medication, and I told her we didn't have it on file (we'd never filled it for her). She said, "I'm just sure I got it at Walmart." I checked other Walmarts through the computer, and I couldn't find it anywhere. (Quick question: If I don't have the medication on file, how did Albertson's already call me and transfer it?) I asked, "What does your label say?" She said it was completely worn off and she couldn't even see anything on the label. It was completely blank. Hmmmm. Then she said, "Oh, I think I filled it at the hospital. I'm sure that's where it is. Could you call there and transfer it?" I explained to her that she needed to call Albertson's and have them call the hospital pharmacy. She said, "Well, I want you to call because I want to get it there." I guess my customer service was so good she changed her mind and figured the distance to Walmart was worth it. So, I called both the hospital outpatient and instacare pharmacies, and they'd never heard of her. I called her back to let her know, and she said she wanted me to call her doctor. I asked her who the doctor was, and she said, "Doesn't it show on my file what doctor prescribed it?" I got a little snippy at that point and said, "NO! Not if you never filled it here before." I was getting frustrated. Then she asked if I could call and have the other Walmart call her doctor because she lives right next to that Walmart. Wait, didn't she just say she lived right by Albertson's? (There's no Albertson's even remotely close to the other Walmart.) I gave her the other Walmart's phone number and hung up quickly.