I have been contacted by a medical reporter from a national paper – no, not the ENQUIRER –
He is interested in doing a story on the swing from shortage to surplus of RPH’s in less than 10 yrs and how it is impacting the profession.
He is looking for people who had to have attorneys send letters to corporate to stop being threatened your job for not breaking the law and or having to go so fast that you are putting pt’s health at risk from med errors and lacking the time to provide counseling – as required by law.
AND/OR
Rph’s that have filed lawsuits against their employers because they were fired for nebulous reasons… including for being a “Senior Pharmacist”
For the time being, I have turned off the requirement on my blog, that you have to enter your email address to make a comment… as long as the spammers don’t get too bad.. I will keep it off for a while..
I am trying to make this as anonymous as possible.. that is how important I consider this !!! If you are willing to correspond with the reporter anonymously, please include your email address with your comments.. I will not release them to the reporter… unless he requests specific ones.. and will confirm your willingness to correspond before I do.
IMO.. the law profession is taking notice of what is going on in the world of pharmacy… many of you are going to end up being a defendant in a case – over a med error – if things don’t go in a different direction… Some of you have already reluctantly became plaintiffs .. over being encouraged/forced to break the law.. and having to go to court. Personally, I would rather be a plaintiff than a defendant !
Spread the word… only you can make a difference for our beloved profession..
Filed under: General Problems
I remember reading that a lot of CVS pharmacists in Florida and California were suing. Any way to tap into that stream?
From Steve: These RPH’s (or their attorneys) are going to have to come forward – if these RPH’s sued and then settled before going to trial – most likely it was settled with a confidentially agreement.. meaning everyone involved was “gagged” about talking about anything concerning the issued.
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I’m not a pharmacist, but Nieman Marcus lost big in an age-discrimination lawsuit a number of years ago. They fired a lot of long-term, older employees to hire younger, cheaper replacements. I’ll look up a reference and post it here shortly.
Anotherone, I think we may have been working for the same chain. If you would like to share your story, I would be glad to hear it. Don’t know that I could help. But, I can listen. Just let Steve know you are interested in communicating with me, give him your email address, and we can exchange emails.
I was fired after 15+ years of spotless performance, along with my partner (20+years,) our other partner (5 yrs) was allowed to keep his job with a demotion in pay (for doing the same thing which was against company policy.) There are so many fucking policies in the 100 page handbook, we’d have no idea what we’d violated. Our quest to become the #1 store in our district paid off… we Were, in every metric/category. I’d turned myself inside/out for my PATIENTS. I was happy with my partners and my crew of techs. Still, told to take my name off of the wall, gather my stuff and go home.
Many long nights of soul searching, sleepless nights. Applying to all my local pharmacies- no job openings. Unemployment denied, ( I was fired) My husband makes $35,000 a year, so I have to find a job fast…..
My question…if this was such a grievous, heinous assault to the company (NOT against State/Federal law of course, just an internal policy) why not all 3 of us? If not an attempt to get rid of an employee who had earned 5 weeks of vacation and is now 62 years old…why not tell that employee, don’t do that again! Coaching?
They (the chain) can hire in a new grad…pay them $20/hr less, and make them work up the chain to get that vacation! Plus the healthcare savings!
If we can really do something to these chains, contact me and I’ll put you in touch with at least 2 other 60+ pharmacists who were fired for crazy reasons.
143k with no overtime. They can hire someone much cheaper and not have to pay them 4 weeks vacation. But I’m going to try to take as much business away from them as possible.
You use to hear how WM use to put “the screws” to their supplier to sell it to them cheaper… how a large part of their employees didn’t make enough that they qualified for Medicaid.. now that the RPH surplus is here.. they are putting the screws to their “professional staff”.. Hiring newly minted RPH’s at a lower salary package will allow them to keep their $4.00/Rxs in place longer…