Telephoned Prescriptions

Its common knowledge that a prescription can only get to a pharmacy to be filled 3 different ways:

• Written Rx
  • Fax
    • Telephone
      Now lets focus on the third one, telephone.
      State law allows prescriptions to be phoned in by a doctor or a doctor’s agent. “Doctors Agent” pretty much means anyone with a pulse. It does not specify the education needed, nor any requirements short of working with the Doctor.
      State law only allows pharmacists to recieve the verbal prescription over the phone. Tech’s cant do it, clerks cant do it, janitors cant do it. Only a licensed pharmacist can accept a verbal from the phone.
      Whoever wrote this law must either hate pharmacists, or have not stepped one foot in a pharmacy in their life; because now every doctor’s office has some minimum wage making minority who can barely speak english calling in medications for YOUR mother. Thats right! Someone who has zero medical knowledge and has no clue what they are saying are calling in medication for YOUR LOVED ONES! HU-FUCKING-ZZA!
      Bah, so they got hydralazine and hydroxyzine mixed up, or Lamictal and Lamisil confused. Or Lamictal and lomotil, no biggie! Your loved one only ended up in the hospital, and a big fat lawsuit pending on yours truly.
      Now dont get me wrong, there are lots of doctors offices out there who employ nurses and other very qualified (meaning they speak english) personel to call in prescriptions. Its just that one cheap-ass doctor who gets some phillipino or chinese fresh off of the boat for $4.50/hr to phone in prescriptions to pharmacies which are blaring loud already, they cant pronounce the drug, and to make it worse they speak super super quietly on the phone!
      It just pisses me off to no end as well when they get offended when you ask them to repeat it about 10 times, then spell the damn drug. Its not my fault you cant speak english clearly. Its not my fault you cant pronounce the drug. Its not my fault you dont know any medical shorthand so you have to waste my time and ask what ‘po tid uf’ means.
      So please, for the sake of your patients, your liability insurance, and my sanity get someone who can speak clear english on the line when you need prescriptons called in. Your pharmacist will <3 you for it.

Comments #

Comment by Cynnical Technician on 2007-03-04 18:17:58 -0800 #

I know you wrote this a couple years ago..you should come to Michigan..the techs do all the work. Meaning I take doctor calls, fill rx’s, sell rx’s, call insurance companies, call the doctors for pa’s, refills, and pretty much everything. The pharmacists either sit on their cell phones all day or take 5,398 cigarette breaks.

Comment by The Ole’ Apothecary on 2007-08-05 18:25:29 -0700 #

My solution is simple. Change the law by substituting the words “doctor’s authorized agent” with “doctor’s authorized agent, who must be a licensed pharmacy technician.”

Comment by DocJim on 2007-09-14 04:04:49 -0700 #

I would like to have either (1) phone number answering machine with no elaborate menus (starting with “Press ‘1’ for English”) or (2) an English speaking person answering the phone calls at the pharmacy.
I use a fax often to avoid these above problems, but the faxes are still sitting in the machine for hours and hours or they were trashed on the hour.
In this day and age, it ain’t easy on the doc’s side of things either.

Comment by JenJen on 2009-08-06 20:19:15 -0700 #

Arrggghh! Pff, I work for a large chain ( not w-mart) pharmacy in Ontario, and this one receptionist calls in repeats for a patient monthly. When questioned what medications she is authorizing refills on, she gives what I can only describe as a “phone shrug” and says “everything”.
“what’s everything?” asks me
“Just everything” responds dumb-dumb

I mean I could, and have listed medications that the patient isn’t even taking, and she’ll agree, talk about a dumb bitch, and the attitude she has.

Comment by Pharmacy Manager on 2010-03-03 13:06:33 -0800 #

Ain’t that the truth. Thank God for e-Prescribing and fax Rx’s. Back in the day, if it wasn’t hand written, it was verbal. What I hate the most is verbal on voice mail. half the time they don;t even spell the patients name and just assume you know exactly who they are talking about. 🙁

Comment by Jajajenny on 2013-05-01 21:04:51 -0700 #

OMG, I’m the dumb bitch, I just responded to a comment I left in 2009.

Comment by E on 2018-01-04 09:39:32 -0800 #

I know you didn’t include all the details needed for someone to call in a fake script….. But you came kinda close. I’m not trying to lecture you at all. … I just know from others mistakes and shall we say seedy business ventures that maybe you should edit this blog post a bit. Then again, I’m just a layman.