Below are three comments made on this blog.. to me, each of these comments are disturbing… but the fact that all three comments were made within a 24 hr period… is it extremely disturbing to me. Back in the 80’s and 90’s Pharmacists always showed up as the most respected profession.. the last survey I saw.. we are now down to FOURTH. According to one poster – who professes to be a pharmacy student – many of his/her fellow students are there because of the perceived “fat pay check” Mistakes are a regular happening… I know that last placed I temped at for a number of years.. between the reduced Pharmacists hours and poorly trained techs.. errors got so routine that the Pharmacists stated to become jaded to them happening… When we discovered a med error had occurred .. generally the discussion went …” what was the error “… “did it get out of the bldg ?”… “did it get to the pt ?”… “did the pt take the wrong med ?”… “Is the pt ok ?” In the very end.. as long as there there was no harm to the pt… the common thought was “no harm .. no foul …” If you don’t call that jaded.. what do you call it.. IMO.. patient safety – especially in the retail/community setting – is not just on a slippery slope … it is in FREE FALL
It is my understanding that it is the pharmacist’s job to ensure that the environment is “safe” and if that means staffing to meet those needs then it is your obligation to do so. In my law class, my professor (the author of our state pharmacy law’s) told us a story about a pharmacist he knew that worked in an environment that was not staffed properly and he had repeatedly gone back to the corporate office telling them he needed more tech hours which they constantly ignored. So the error occurs, a patient dies, and now his license is on the line, and the board says to him that since he admitted he was “aware” of the unsafe working conditions and did nothing about it (as he is obligated to do) that falls under negligence and the pharmacist lost his license. It seems to me that if all of us CVS (and other big box retail) pharmacists would staff the way we feel is necessary, any sort of disciplinary action against us could be won in court ???
Mistakes happen on a semi regular basis. The pharmacists are just scared to report them knowing CVS has younger pharmacists just waiting on the sidelines to happily work for less. It is impossible to make a pharmacy function like a fast food drive thru and expect top notch care. Something has to give.
Old Tech I agree with you. You say a lot of valid points. I am a student right now and at least at my school they are teaching us not to chase the money and not to accept unsafe working conditions (or to go against our morals and ethics) for the high pay. Unfortunately the portion of graduates who decided to be a pharmacist only for the money are always going to be the ones who work for the big box pharmacies. You are right about the mistakes too, it is encouraged to sweep them under the rug, or if the pharmacist is making mistakes that threaten patients or break laws they are simply moved to another store (yeah that solves the problem) and don’t get me started about the ethics line.
Filed under: General Problems
I couldn’t agree more with Goose and Steve has been telling all to Document Document. For those that do have the guts to send email to middle management also copy it to someone at the BOP. They don’t care now, but for future it can’t hurt. Here in PA if you voice just one concern it writing you will become a target. This district has just hired 10 grad interns so I think more changes are coming. We have a huge paper trail but it’s all part of the legal thing. The BOP here in PA is well aware of huge errors that could have been deadly. I pray the day comes soon that these documents become public.
First of all, if a pharmacist reports unsafe working conditions to CVS and documents it and they do nothing, how can the BOP say he was negligent?
The key here is that you need to document and save the email of every time you complain, be specific about staffing like “the new flex schedule cut my overall tech hours by 15% and business is up 10%.” not “we never have enough help”.
If you do this properly there is no way the BOP can pin it on you.
What control do you have over the day to day functions of your pharmacy? About none I would say. Your DM and Pharmacy Supervisor have a lot though.
Get smart people.
5 rights 1- correct patient,2-correct drug 3-correct dose 4- current route 5-correct time,, Not to bad for not working in 15 long painful years. Nurse dispensing medication not to be interrupted and nurse transcribing was not to be interrupted. But emergencies happened. We all followed the rules when jcoha and head nurse was around but when you were the only one around you do what you had to. Big threat was what if you injured or killed some one,? I have to agree with the smart student. I honestly do not see how the pharmacist worked at the CVS. when I use to go th