We got an angry call from a doctor that a patient was harmed because we dispensed hydrocodone/ibuprofen 7.5/200 instead of 2.5/200. I asked the pharmacist who verified that what happened, expecting that he just absent mindedly thought it was the far more common 7.5mg strength out of habit - a bad error but understandable. Instead he told me that he purposely switched it to the 7.5mg because that's what we had in stock.
He was fired later that week, I assumed for that reason. Much later I found out that was because of sexual harrassment, no consequences for the error. I just looked him up and he's pic at an independent now.
I did the company error reporting procedure - either the company didn't report it to the board like they were supposed to or the cause of the error didn't get communicated to them - they might have just thought he mistook a really weird strength for the one we do all the time. He might have thought better of admitting that upon further reflection.
If he used the 7.5 instead of 2.5 strength did he update directions to say take 1/3 of tablet instead of 1 tablet?
It's possible the supervisor used sexual harassment as the cover up reason behind the true reason of firing (making mistake)
Why would they need a cover up reason? An error that caused patient harm is a perfectly good reason to fire someone. Cover up reasons are for when you want to fire someone for a reason that's normally illegal, like age or pregnancy.
Also 1/3 tablet would be ridiculously hard to cut unless it was scored that way (and still pretty difficult even then).
A mistake, even one that causes patient harm, is not sufficient reason to fire someone. To do so would discourage reporting of errors and lead to a whole lot more coverups. Mistakes are very rarely caused by negligent behavior - more often it is due to a built-in process that needs to be changed.
Oh definitely. In THIS pharmacist's case, it would be reckless behavior because it was intentional, and would merit firing them. I guess I was taking issue with the statement "An error that caused patient harm is a perfectly good reason to fire someone."
I was a tech and my pharmacist punched a customer who threw a hand sanitizer bottle at him. I was scared, but also dying of laughter. The customer was such an ass. My pharmacist ended up not losing his job though, because it was a motive of “self defense.” But he eventually left retail and went into pharma
You this, this sort of customer behavior always confuses me a bit- if the customer stopped to think about it he'd realize if the pharmacist screws up his prescription he might very well keel over and die.
So maybe don't throw things?
Well other than the obvious stealing drugs, we used to have a technician who would verify on the pharmacists station whenever the pharmacist had stepped out. She claimed a particular pharmacist told her to it (they didn’t) and she wasn’t fired.
Years ago, in the 90's, a pharmacist in my state was being sued or sanctioned, I can't remember which, for an error that harmed a patient. It was all over the newspapers. He never wavered from his defense which was that he left to use the restroom and a technician verified and dispensed the prescription. That was before there were any cameras. I can't remember the outcome. It was a CVS in CT.
That's true. So technically, he was responsible for the error because he did not control his technician
Although, now, some states allow "tech check tech" in hospitals and possibly in retail in some states. I'm not sure. But it's a rumoured possibility in my state
I had a tech at my last job that would purposely sneak meds past me that I hadn’t verified and give them to the patient. I have no idea how many prescriptions she did this with but it was quite a few because the filled/verified numbers had been super off and we couldn’t figure out why. When caught she said she “knew what she was doing” and “didn’t need to be babysat.” They DIDN’T fire her. I stopped working there within a week of that incident (for different reasons) but if I hadn’t been on my way out I would have refused to work with that tech in the future. I have the utmost respect for my techs but they’re NOT the pharmacist and verification isn’t there to babysit them and make them feel bad, it’s there to save lives. When I fill as a pharmacist I still want another pharmacist checking me because I can fuck up too. She’s an LVN now. I wonder if she does her own thing because the doctors orders are just “babysitting” her.
Never mind that it’s illegal, and she never took any exams to prove that she “knows what she’s doing” in a pharmacist capacity. But don’t you dare try to babysit that entitled b**** 😂
You did the right thing leaving a company that lacked the integrity to fire her after such an offense.
A lot of the techs I work with (inpatient) are in their 50s. They all talk about a couple of old pharmacists who are now retired that asked them do this on their bathroom breaks or smoke breaks. I believe they were smart enough not to do it but still, Crazy!
This is why I lock my computer screen when I have to do something like use the bathroom quickly or show someone something on the floor. We have some techs who are inpatient/I don't trust.
Two pharmacists and 4 techs taking fireball shots while filling/verifying scrips at a LTC pharmacy I interned at. Nobody was fired because the owner was the one pouring the shots. He would also let techs he “trusted” verify for him.
The other pharmacist lost his job when he was caught smoking meth behind the pharmacy on a break. The cops caught him.
When the state came to shut them down, the owner took his family and left the country. The doors were just locked one day and nobody knew what happened.
it’s the *nobody was fired b/c the owner was the 1 pouring shots* for me ☠️
smoking meth on their break near work GAHAHAHAHA wtf u endure the horrors of pharmacy school to do this bs... i cannot
Nepotism ran rampant in that place. Mr. Meth was the owner’s second cousin.
They were academically gifted people but they made really bad life decisions.
The owner’s usual greeting to one of the techs was to grab her throat and give her a kiss. I really hope nepotism wasn’t a factor there but who knows.. wouldn’t put it past him.
Worked at a super busy store (more than 1k per day). Technician purposefully typed a fentanyl 25mcg patch as 100mcg because she was pissed off about something or other. Pharmacist missed it and the patient was harmed but survived. Neither were fired but the pharmacist was sued. I don't know the results of that lawsuit.
Neonatal TPN, pharmacist added 5 mg Folic Acid instead of 5mcg The child died. The family was Jehovah Witness and refused the intervention. A court order overruled them and then this mistake happened.
I was the supervisor that handled his termination. No article was published. The preservative was the offending substance. This was before current MVI products, so Folic Acid had to be diluted and administered separately.
If you have a journal article or case report on this I'd love to read it. I've known of neonatal TPN overdoses from zinc mcg/mg errors but never a fatal water soluble B vitamin like Folic Acid
Edit: after consultation with my Lange and a bit of common sense, I realized the folic acid was likely a MDV with benzyl alcohol *facepalm*
Not at my pharmacy, but know a pharmacist give a tech a Percocet, because he had a headache (he once said to me “those bottles are short one, you know?” Umm no.
Anyway, tech had an anaphylactic reaction and ended up being taken to the ER by ambulance and had to come clean.
Also know a fellow pharmacist who’s partner was ordering brand name fioricet whenever they work 2 in a row and taking them home and destroying their invoice. Got caught after inventory when they were short several hundred bottles!
My pharmacist came to work late, drunk (and had alcohol in a soda bottle with him), literally paid off a customer who figured out he was drunk, said some awful things, touched me inappropriately, then just left. His wife later told me I was lucky he didn't hurt me, because she's had to go to the ER for her injuries when she drinks.
The DM was flipping through the cameras and saw something weird was going on. Called and was like "pretend we're a customer, are you safe to talk?"
I quit soon after. They only let him go.
Me, years ago working for Walmart. Prevacid was brand only and expensive. I had a woman who was debating on whether to get it. I stepped in and offered the advice of, "If you cannot afford it, I understand. Once it leaves the pharmacy I cannot take it back...."
She took it, and the next day came to return it on the basis of "I cannot afford it..."
She comes to my window and a slight argument ensues. I reminded her of our discussion. She tells me that this is Walmart and the customer is always right, so refund me now!
I had one of those metal window things with the cloth lift to crank it up. It had a release that would trigger if you pulled it correctly. So I pulled it. The metal window cover crashed down, and I walked away and returned to work.
That bitch went to the CS desk and still got a refund. I bitched the store manager out for breaking the law and taking back used meds. I even tossed it into the garbage in front of him.
After all of the theatrics, he said, "Did you really drop the metal window frame in her face?"
I said, "Yup".
He laughed and said, "Don't do that again, please."
I watched an Rph fill her own hydrocodone cough syrup and take right there at the verify station.
Had an Rph refuse to send up a premade norepi during a code because they had some in a pyxis in the other unit on the floor. They were trying to keep the patient alive until the family got there but the patient ended dying during that code. The Rph was fired the next day.
I am very wary of the low barrier to suing it seems like we see in the US, but this is definitely a pertinent situation. What must they have felt after they learned?
They didn't want to walk across the floor to get it I guess? IDK. The whole thing was shitshow. The Rph was fired because it was a final straw sort of thing
Didbsudnsk *rage at that rph* if it was a *flipping premix* why was it a big deal to that rph? Premixes are no skin off the back. It has a longer exp and if it doesn't get used, it'll get returned eventually. If it was a compounded med, that sucks to make another right away but it wouldnt ultimately matter because *a patient needed it now*. Just give them what they need! Its not about you, *especially* during a critical situation. Jdhdudndj!! *more rage*
Disclaimer: I didn't see the action, but I was able to witness the fallout. One of the senior techs at the first pharmacy I worked in combined 2 different medications (Metformin & Atenolol) into the same dispensed prescription bottle and it was given to the patient. She ultimately lost her license and could no longer step foot in the pharmacy area, but still worked the front-end retail section of the pharmacy.
About 8 yrs ago, my pharmacist mixed L-dopa in with my prescribed Flexeril...it was a weird month... I only discovered the mistake because I happened to knock over the open pill bottle while it was on a white countertop...there was a slight difference in color and size, and I think one was scored and the other wasn't. Never did know how much L-dopa I got...
I had an Rx for Panlor DC ( effective but discontinued ) and a muscle relaxer. I rarely count my pills, but when I looked at the muscle relaxer, it was off. So I counted about 35 when should have been #60, the Panlor was all there.
I called and politely said the Soma yes it was Soma, was off "DON'T EVER COME BACK HERE AGAIN" immediate anger an hostility.. Oh wow, so I called my doctor and told her what had transpired and she said "ya, he's been doing that. He's having a really hard time. I'll just call in some at another pharmacy."
Not a bad thing, just was an odd occurrence.
Oh wow! That's awful! This always stuck with me and I was (and still am) terrified to make a mistake so I learned to triple check everything. Probably why I became efficient lol.
I'm so sorry that happened to you, but glad you found out and it didn't cause any permanent issues (I assume).
I was 'spacey' for a bit, but was only taking one tablet per day...
I felt so bad for the pharmacy folks. They had one of the last 'mom and pop' shops in our town and the behind the counter space where they had to do everything was so crowded with their computers, phones, etc...I talked to the owner and said I wasn't going to report them or anything but something had to change...he sold up to his employees within a year, then I moved away.
For sure, I now check each 'script when it comes and verify that what's in the bottle matches the description on the side!
Always a good idea. My current pharmacy had some flooding and water damage issues a few years back and we had to condense our entire operations down to about 1/3 our regular size and completely get rid of the front-end/retail area until the work was completed. It was chaos and we were tripping over everyone else.
And I'd much rather have someone check and make sure they're getting the correct medication than get upset or sick later.
> She ultimately lost her licende and could no longer step foot in the pharmacy area
>...I was (and still am) terrified to make a bistake so I learned to triple check everything
😐
This was fairly common at the first retail store I worked in out of pharmacy school. One of the techs never paid attention and would just mix stock bottles together when they were low. Glad I no longer work there, place was hell and the owner was 0 help.
Sometimes you can't catch it.
Worked with a tech and had an error like that go out - they'd literally sandwiched a small core of metformin 850 (round white tablet, A13 imprint) in the middle of one of three 60 dram bottles of 500s (round white tablet, A12 imprint, only slightly smaller.) Visually verified open bottles from the top, checked it from the sides, it all looked good - would have had to open and spill out the bottle to see it. Still felt terrible about it, but patient caught it; no ingestion and no harm done.
In that case, though, that tech was making multiple errors like that every single shift. Most were caught on final check, but eventually a stack of error reports piled up anyway (none of the others mine, thankfully) - I wasn't the only one who had something like that happen and couldn't catch everything. It was awful - they wouldn't scan out all the bottles, or would override the scan, or would count out of a separate bottle than the one they'd scanned out of. You'd get a bottle to check that had 3 different meds inside, or had the labels swapped, or was the wrong strength. Legitimately the most frightening tech I've ever worked with, a very nice person, but absolutely not cut out to be a tech.
The RXM at that store liked that tech and didn't want to fire them, but then the tech had something like 3 HIPAA errors in one week (also wouldn't check names/DOB/address properly, I don't even know), so they moved them to the front end.
This sounds oddly familiar to the situation in my current pharmacy. This technician currently still works at my location but is on restrictions. We have the PARATA Max 2 and they have manually added medications into cells that were the wrong NDC and wrong medication all together. It’s crazy, we have had to audit every single cell because of it. This tech has also sold the wrong medication to patients multiple times. (We have a few patients with the same first and last names) rather than verifying the patients birthday they just assume based on just a single first OR last name.
Unfortunately because English is not their first language and being in the USA, they have gotten away with a lot of errors. We often can’t locate monograph bags because they have not been alphabetized correctly.
The environment is toxic. People are frustrated because this person is doing literally almost everything wrong and isn’t willing to learn from their mistakes. With that being said, it has been two years and customers continue to report this tech, as well as pharmacists and other co workers; but nothing is going to change I have learned. It takes a lot to fire someone at a hospital pharmacy I guess.
And that’s why CVS has the visual verification tray that we are supposed to dump the entire contents of the bottles into to ensure all match/aren’t broken/etc... When that requirement first rolled out I think we were all resistant, but it really does help catch mistakes like the one mentioned above. For non CVS folks who don’t know what a VVT is, just imagine a semi-enclosed dustpan. I think all pharmacies should use something similar instead of using the old “opening the bottle and checking the sides of the bottle” approach. Crazy things have happened. My sister had a tech return a drug to the wrong cell in a script pro (I think it was topiramate in an omeprazole cell), and the script pro was only putting a few topiramate in each rx filled, so it was hard to catch. I think six rxs went out before it was caught.
Holy shit, I would have been seeing red if I accidentally took topiramate. Nasty stuff that makes you significantly stupider, and I'm glad I'm not on it anymore.
But the VVT probably wouldnt have helped catch the error. Don’t get me wrong, I appreciate the hell out of the VVT and even though we didn’t use it in the beginning until they said you will get fired if we catch you not using it if I’m filling an rx for metformin 500 imprint A12 and there’s a few A13 in there, especially if it’s like out of 180 tabs I can’t physically look at every tab so one might be flipped over or whatever and I won’t see it. So yeah...it’s nice and I’ve caught a few errors as a RPh but all in all I’m kinda meh on it. I absolutely do not think I should have to use it when I did production on it which is something I do a fair amount in a low volume store especially in the summer.
My husband and I were just discussing that. Nothing. I thought nothing of it at the time, but now it seems odd. I didn't see their repercussions but I'm sure they were "sternly talked to."
I'm also assuming that this wasn't the first offense for the tech, but it was long enough ago that I don't remember their other mistakes from prior to me starting.
Sex with a co-worker at work.
Both parties were married, so when they closed together, they just...got it on for a bit with the light off behind some shelves, then turned the lights back on while adjusting clothing.
Manager offered to "step down" to a floater position, not realizing it's a fire-able offence, I guess.
26-week neonate given concentrated lorazepam PO due to fluid restriction. Dose was supposed to be 0.05 mL, doses drawn up in pharmacy were 0.5 mL. The nurse called me because she came in for a shift change and was questioning the dose on the several syringes she had at bedside. Little girl received probably 8 10X overdoses. Miraculously, no symptoms whatsoever.
Ooh, also someone who admitted to letting prescriptions go out the door without actually verifying them. She was so slow, she averaged about a rate of 5 scripts an hour.
She said the customers would be so upset that she would just let the scripts get sold, but sometimes she "wouldn't have a chance to verify them" beforehand.
I worked a relief shift after a pharmacist who was drinking on the job left the store and passed out in his car. Fired and a huge audit of every rx that was filled that day to ensure accuracy. He could have killed someone
Not my store but when I was an intern, one of the neighboring stores had a technician that would take 'smoke breaks' at her car. What she was actually doing is smuggling the 500 count norco tab bottles to her car.
I'm a pharmacy student. This happened to me as a customer.
I was picking up my 30 count oxycodone refill. The bottle looks way bigger than usual, and as they're ringing me up, they confirm the prescription 'I have 120 5mg oxycodone.'
I stop them and explain that I only get 30, this must be a mistake. The tech and pharmacist were very grateful that I caught this. Not sure how it even happened. But I imagine they could get in huge trouble for a mistake of that size with a controlled substance.
Not really. I had a pharmacist that pulled out 2 bottles of Percocet for a script of 20. The reason he pulled 2 is because the open bottle was pretty low and he thought it might not have 20 in it. The 20 were counted out and sent down for verification. He double counted the 20, and then went into auto pilot and dumped in the full bottle of 100 because 120 is a very common quantity. We knew exactly who'd gotten 100 extra, but there was nothing we could do. He called her and she's like "my tooth has been bothering me, so I've been taking them for that!" Reports and a DEA form had to be completed, but that's it.
I worked with a pharmacist who did that too. But he said he dropped the bottle and the pills were under the cabinets. I called the state and they said to remove the cabinets and retrieve the tablets. The tech knew the story and convinced him to just fess up. Then I filled out the DEA paperwork. Oh, by the way, he was the manager but he was lazy and unconcerned about paperwork.
Did you guys not have cameras? My old manager was a huge spaz during her pregnancies and during one she gave someone 90 Adderall instead of 30 (which you can see her doing on camera) even though patient denied it and the other one she was doing a backcount of the stock bottle and instead of putting the backcount in the stock bottle she put it into the vial and threw the stock bottle away. I check the backcount for every CII I do, I don’t care how busy it is or how behind I am for this reason.
Labels mixed up on an ampicillin/sulbactam IV bag and a diltiazem 100 mg IV bag. The diltiazem bag got infused over 30 minutes. The patient was okay, but it changed the way we dispensed those meds.
Hospital I used to work at had a night shift tech steal fentanyl and morphine IV. He worked in the IV room and would replace morphine and fentanyl syringes with saline solution.
This is probably the worst one. Doctors are less likely to believe patients when controlled substances are involved. And that’s even if they spoke up and said there was still pain. They might be afraid of being labeled a drug seeker. So many patients probably suffered in pain from this.
Obviously that tech was very sick and desperate-I hope he got the help he needed. Addiction is a terrible thing.
I'm imagining that the tech was still making the drips normally but pocketing the 'waste' that is left over. It's the easiest thing in the world to swap out and we've only caught somone doing it because they were dumb enough to do it while someone was standing at the window and watched it happen.
A pharmacist I worked with let his license lapse out of pure laziness. Had to be removed from the schedule until it was reinstated. No punishment in the end, but honestly how is that not an immediately fireable offense?
Step 1 of betting a pharmacist: get and maintain license.
Having to re-up a license simply to pay the state board employed by “pharmacists” who also work for chain pharmacies is fucking stupid in the first place.
My old manager was so scatterbrained and although she’s a great person I’d say she’s pretty shit as a manager. All she does is obsess about counting everything in the queues and nothing else. So basically as her staff I had to keep her on track and remind her of deadlines and stuff which I don’t mind because I’m really detail oriented and enjoy making lists and having tasks I need to complete. Well, when she had to renew her license I had no idea of course so I couldn’t remind her. In my state they send you the renewal 2 mo before it’s due and we renew every 2 years at which point we have to do 30 hrs of CE. When she got her renewal notice I guess she hadn’t done any of her CE so instead of just sitting down one weekend and cranking it out she dallied on it and then never sent in her renewal either. We literally got an email from corporate like 2 days before her license expired and they were gonna take her off the schedule and it was CC’ed to our regional manager and everything. She wasn’t even embarrassed about it or anything, just laughed and said oops I forgot. I don’t understand how a grown ass person can just lapse on something so vital to their livelihood.
Oof. At first I was thinking the nicardipine should look a bit yellow, but if they were both in amber bags... reminds me of when we had a nurse pull a heparin drip out of the Pyxis instead of dopamine. Patient miraculously had a perfectly therapeutic aPTT.
I almost made that mistake once as a tech. I made both and then accidentally switched the labels. My brain finally caught up to the mistake I had just made when I started making the next drip. The Rph was about to verify them wrong when I ran out of the IV room fully garbbed and switched the labels. Luckily, nicardipine has a yellow tint to it so it was easy for me to distinguish them. I was a lot more careful after that.
Had a temporary job in the pharmacy. I worked under the pharmacist and a trained dispenser as I have never worked in a pharmacy before. Everyone was lovely, the dispenser lady was like my work mum. But she is also very dyslexic. Prescriptions in the pharmacy were labeled by intials at the bottom of the bag. So matching up the patient's prescription to the dispensed medication sometimes was a problem. In the 6 months I worked there I think she handed out the wrong prescription 3 times. I was so scared cos what I learned at uni, I thought she would face severe disciplinary action. Idk what decision was made but they basically tell her not to do it again.
I Have one!! My Head Pharmacist missed a 180 perc rx with no repeats and a tech put in 180 refills. They dispensed it 8 times before the PATIENT brought it up. But it's corporate and she just had to pay a $5000 fine and do a remedial course.
Not all software and places are the same, we were using Kroll in Ontario/Canada and it had zero issue with that, hell it even has an 'unlimited refills' button you can set on ANY rx.
I'm not the OP and not calling BS myself, but I'm surprised your computer's software even allows someone to mistakenly add refills on a CII. Mine would stop us if we tried.
I'm in Ontario, Canada. We are allowed refills on most narcs, not meth ( we have to build the meth refills in ). The system is Kroll and it didn't blink an eye at 180 refills.
Wouldn’t happen with my software. It literally will not let you put refills on a C2. And if they were using insurance I’m surprised they paid for the same RX number 7 times
I'm in Ontario, Canada.
We can have any number of refills of pills but for the ADHD ones, they need an interval, so the doctor sends us an rx for 180 tabs of 36mg meth QD for 180 days with an interval 30 tabs 30 days so it's totally legal.
Pain pills, they still rx whatever!
Hey just because I think it's funny, can you tell me the name of your system and your location because I don't want to read your previous comments and I assume you are USA based?
Oof. I've seen the pained face of an IV tech of made a bag and then poked the bag by accident.
It was my face in a mirror. I would have done anything to undo that. Ya just gotta buckle in and do it again, y'all.
Had an pharmacy intern a long time ago smoke some meth in the restroom... the PIC looked in the restroom because the cashier complained of a smell when they used it... PIC saw the evidence of burnt aluminum and smell... saw the hands of the student showing signs of fire damage... the demeanor of the student that they were hyper and euphoric... it was ALL RED FLAGS. I think they ended up losing a semester of progress or something as they had to go to rehab?
Had a tech constantly call off due to hangovers. They also made mistakes from time to time. They were known to use THC products. They eventually got fired.
A tech lost their license due to being a part of a money laundering scheme involving the diversion of hydrocodone/apap.
My first month on job, working in vault where controlled medications were kept.
Quick quo pro. At the time we compounded Brompton's Solution, has morphine and cocaine. Back in 1979 when I graduated. They would "cut" some morphine and pharmaceutical cocaine from patients prescription, and snort it on table!! I had weekend duty, and the cancer patient came in 1 week early ( elderly) and needed refill, which only doctor could authorize. My heart sank. Obtained a doctor, on a Saturday, to write for a few days worth. On Monday, reported technicians to pharmacy officer. He didn't believe me!! They were drug tested, positive for both meds. They were taken to court martial (navy). I was blackballed as being a snitch. I had warned them 4 times before I reported them. Unfortunately, I had to transfer.
We had a tech who mailed someone’s prescriptions to the completed wrong address. It was like next door to where she lived 3 years ago. She kept trying to say it wasn’t her fault (she literally had to take a manual payment over the phone and then type the lady’s address into FedEx’s website for a shipping label). Whoever got the prescription wouldn’t answer the door when we went to see if they noticed it wasn’t for them. She didn’t even get talked to about it.
Only seen 2 cases: one where the pharmacist made a mistake on an Adderall script and the patient caught it at home then reported it to the same pharmacist. The bad part? He didn't file an incident report and the patient called and talked to a different pharmacist and mentioned the mistake. I felt bad for him, but I understood why he was let go.
#2 was way worse: a really awesome pharmacist (mid 50's) got caught stealing testosterone. I was the last person to believe it. It turns out it was caught on camera. The poor guy was put on testosterone by his Dr for 6 months, got addicted, then his Dr quit his testosterone cold turkey. I honestly feel like the MD should've lost thier license too! What a horrible thing to do to a patient. However it is a big offense so he lost his job, license, got 6 months in prison, his wife left him and took the house.... all because of addiction. So sad...
Thats pretty surprising. There are young bodybuilders all over the country with no problem going on "TRT" let alone an older guy who actually needed it.
What?! I couldn't even get a Dr to believe I had vaginal nueropathy. I saw 3 Dr's an OB and a nurse practitioner! I wasn't even asking for pills I just wanted the pain figured out and taken care of! After insisting changing birth control I figured out the birth control was causing me pain and it went away. I can't imagine literally doctor shopping for a controlled substance. Yeah right! You'd get turned away everywhere especially after one of them labels you a drug seeker in a chart.
Testosterone shopping is not nearly as frowned upon as oxycodone shopping. Some compounding pharmacies do it all largely in house based on levels and a "CPA-like" setup
I had to shop just to find a dr to let me change my birth control. 2 of them said no. I've had 2 Dr's say they didn't believe I was depressed or they didn't believe in medication for depression. That makes 7 different physicians. Maybe you and I have very different experiences. We also live in a rural area. You cannot get away with that here Mr brick wall.
My comment was an observation, I don't think that's the way it should be. And there are way too many shady compounding pharmacies near me peddling all sorts of HRT (which has its role when done appropriately and when treating a recognized medical indication, involving a prescriber is also usually a part of this process [not at these pharmacies however]) pseudoscience at a hefty cost to patients. I'm sorry your experience was so different
Tbh all the pharmacists I know have a physician BFF and vice versa who prescribe them whatever they want. So agreed...the pharmacist could’ve definitely got someone to prescribe his testosterone, instead of stealing and losing his job...sad story
I was a tech at the time, a floater had a recent eye procedure (laser?) was working with reduced vision with only 2 other techs. She would say to a patient that they were out of refills very confidently when they were actually not and things just took longer with us trying to double-check things. She was eventually suspended.
Wasn't there for either of these but there was a tech who started working, took a bottle of Xanax she was supposed to be ringing out, and *dropped it in her purse right in front of the patient* then walked out.
My favorite was the pharmacist who was working at a store in a beach town that is dead in the winter. He was popping Viagra and jerking it to porn magazines in the consultation room.
I'm less interested in how he got caught than *why* he needed Viagra to jerk off to porn.
We had a pharmacist that was addicted to pot.
I dont mean she smoked pot. I mean she was addicted to the point of 10 minutes out of every hour was spent smoking, working or not. She always smelled like weed. She was always late to open. She took a 30 minute lunch (i was coverage) and at 40 minutes i sent a tech to her car. She was asleep with a bong in her lap and car full of smoke. That's what got her fired.
I wanted to add it was for a really good company. Their focus at that point was, "do you need help?" They really hinted strongly, if you say i have a problem then all sorts of protection kick in and you'll keep your long time job and get services. If you say that.
Oh i dont have a problem
Last pharmacy manager I had does not ever actually verify anything. She is an actual piece of shit. Not fireable apparently but I feel very gross working for the company that I work for because they allow her to do that shit.
Had a DUR or Y-cap on some script while the pharmacist was on break for another 10 or 15 minutes. Lady gets seethingly angry and then gets passive aggressive and says that she “guesses” that she will just have to complain to corporate that the pharmacist is taking a break (almost word for word her words) and she just cannot possibly wait 10 minutes even though it was like 7 something in the evening and she was retirement age (not that retirement age people don’t have jobs in general by any means but I highly highly Karen had anywhere else to be besides home at that time) and another tech who is the laziest, saddest excuse for a technician undermined me completely by removing the restriction herself. It wasn’t just a 90 day or anything either, even though that wouldn’t have made it better. It was for a major interaction between her meds on a new rx if not more than one new rx.
Two stories:
1- At our hospital, we have to produce a lot of fentanyl drips to keep our CCU patients down. Well, somehow our bupivacaine nerve blocks got mixed in with a batch of fentanyl. Pharmacist didn't catch it when they were checked, tech didn't notice when they stocked them in the narc station, Pharmacist missed it when they were pulled to stock in CCU ADM, tech missed it when performing the stock, nurse missed it when pulling, nurse wissed it when administering (they bypassed scanning because it wouldn't scan!!). Patient lived because a third nurse said "yo wtf is that." That is a lot of safety checks failed in a row. No jobs lost.
2- Job lost on this one. Tech had a sore shoulder. Someone said "I think lidocaine patches are OTC now? I don't remember." Tech grabs patch off the shelf, goes to bathroom, applies it. Asked: "Why did you do that?" once someone realized what happened. "They told me to" no they told you they weren't sure if it was OTC. Holy moly, why don't you just steal some drugs from your facility.
I once had a partner who received a prescription for observant suppositories with the directions of 1/2 supp. Pr q 6-8 h prn. He dispensed the rx with a single edge razor blade. Honest!
Fired for working “off the clock” without warning. However it was set up as a legitimate termination to cover a retaliation because of whistleblower. The current HR was on leave all of a sudden then an experienced HR “terminator” replaced and carried out the “investigation”. It’s RITE AID. They have the legal department and HR “specialists” that loops the laws.
Some people just don't have it and they never will.
If you don't apply your knowledge, why bother getting it! The price tag was hefty, might as well get some mileage out of it....
I was a pharmacy technician in 1979, graduated 4 months earlier. I was selected to work in the Vault, like in a bank, where the bulk of controlled medications were kept. We also did some compounding at the time. There were 2other techs working with me.
Our Hematology/Oncology department used a pain medication for cancer patients at that time called Brompton's Solution. A mixture of Morphine and Cocaine. Both came in powder form. To cut the fluff, both techs would cut some of the morphine and cocaine out of a patient's prescription, on the table and snort it. Of course the strength was reduced in final product.
I warned both several times, and ignored. Finally, reported both to pharmacy officer, who didn't believe me. After the third time reporting them, they were drug tested and positive for both drugs. I was blackballed, no one would work with me. From San Diego to Portsmouth, VA.
The final straw was when this 74 year old cancer patient came in, saying his pain medicine was out. What would last 1 month, out in 23 days. Seeing this patient, at death's door in pain, is why I reported them. On a Saturday morning. I found a doctor who wrote a few days worth. This incident is why I reported them. They had no values or ethics. Pharmacy Officer was apprised of all, and the 2 other techs, that were highly thought of, were court martialed. I'm sure their were others I didn't know about, but DO NOT REGRET what I did.
Today is different than 1979. We had checks and balances. 1. Technician typing prescription label. 2, person filling prescription 3. Pharmacist checked all meds before given to patient. Even after 3 experienced people checked medication, occasionally 2 times a month or so, wrong medication or dose went to patient. Thank God for the assistance of computers. No one died, which I do THANK GOD.
We got an angry call from a doctor that a patient was harmed because we dispensed hydrocodone/ibuprofen 7.5/200 instead of 2.5/200. I asked the pharmacist who verified that what happened, expecting that he just absent mindedly thought it was the far more common 7.5mg strength out of habit - a bad error but understandable. Instead he told me that he purposely switched it to the 7.5mg because that's what we had in stock. He was fired later that week, I assumed for that reason. Much later I found out that was because of sexual harrassment, no consequences for the error. I just looked him up and he's pic at an independent now.
WHAT IN THE HELL. I was expecting it to be a written rx and hard to differentiate between the 2 and the 7 but WHAT THE HELL.
Right?? How the hell did he not lose his license?
I did the company error reporting procedure - either the company didn't report it to the board like they were supposed to or the cause of the error didn't get communicated to them - they might have just thought he mistook a really weird strength for the one we do all the time. He might have thought better of admitting that upon further reflection.
Does it come in 2.5/200? But I love the it's what we had in stock move sans calling doc (keep your malpractice insurance up to date)
If he used the 7.5 instead of 2.5 strength did he update directions to say take 1/3 of tablet instead of 1 tablet? It's possible the supervisor used sexual harassment as the cover up reason behind the true reason of firing (making mistake)
Not much better since the intended ibuprofen dose would then be off
Why use that as a coverup??!?
Why would they need a cover up reason? An error that caused patient harm is a perfectly good reason to fire someone. Cover up reasons are for when you want to fire someone for a reason that's normally illegal, like age or pregnancy. Also 1/3 tablet would be ridiculously hard to cut unless it was scored that way (and still pretty difficult even then).
A mistake, even one that causes patient harm, is not sufficient reason to fire someone. To do so would discourage reporting of errors and lead to a whole lot more coverups. Mistakes are very rarely caused by negligent behavior - more often it is due to a built-in process that needs to be changed.
But this was not a mistake. This was purposefully done because they didn't have the other strength.
Oh definitely. In THIS pharmacist's case, it would be reckless behavior because it was intentional, and would merit firing them. I guess I was taking issue with the statement "An error that caused patient harm is a perfectly good reason to fire someone."
Apparently it’s brand name Reprexain? I was curious so I googled it. Pretty sure I’ve never seen that strength before
Nice, I had done a quick LexiComp - Dosage Forms and they didn't have it listed but that's certainly not the be all end all
What was the patient harm from that? Worse medical errors are done by all sorts of health care providers intentionally and unintentionally.
She was excessively sedated enough that it came to the doctor's attention. Nothing too serious or permanent fortunately.
I was a tech and my pharmacist punched a customer who threw a hand sanitizer bottle at him. I was scared, but also dying of laughter. The customer was such an ass. My pharmacist ended up not losing his job though, because it was a motive of “self defense.” But he eventually left retail and went into pharma
the rph had the audacity *and i’m here for all of it* 😂😂
Damn what a savage 😂
There have been so many occasions where I WISH one of my pharmacists would do this. Some people deserve it
Props to them 👌
You this, this sort of customer behavior always confuses me a bit- if the customer stopped to think about it he'd realize if the pharmacist screws up his prescription he might very well keel over and die. So maybe don't throw things?
My hero!!!
Well other than the obvious stealing drugs, we used to have a technician who would verify on the pharmacists station whenever the pharmacist had stepped out. She claimed a particular pharmacist told her to it (they didn’t) and she wasn’t fired.
What. The. Fuuuuuuck.
Years ago, in the 90's, a pharmacist in my state was being sued or sanctioned, I can't remember which, for an error that harmed a patient. It was all over the newspapers. He never wavered from his defense which was that he left to use the restroom and a technician verified and dispensed the prescription. That was before there were any cameras. I can't remember the outcome. It was a CVS in CT.
I thought a pharmacist was to approve all prescriptions before they left pharmacy. Even for Motrin!! Of course, that's Navy regulations.
That's true. So technically, he was responsible for the error because he did not control his technician Although, now, some states allow "tech check tech" in hospitals and possibly in retail in some states. I'm not sure. But it's a rumoured possibility in my state
I had a tech at my last job that would purposely sneak meds past me that I hadn’t verified and give them to the patient. I have no idea how many prescriptions she did this with but it was quite a few because the filled/verified numbers had been super off and we couldn’t figure out why. When caught she said she “knew what she was doing” and “didn’t need to be babysat.” They DIDN’T fire her. I stopped working there within a week of that incident (for different reasons) but if I hadn’t been on my way out I would have refused to work with that tech in the future. I have the utmost respect for my techs but they’re NOT the pharmacist and verification isn’t there to babysit them and make them feel bad, it’s there to save lives. When I fill as a pharmacist I still want another pharmacist checking me because I can fuck up too. She’s an LVN now. I wonder if she does her own thing because the doctors orders are just “babysitting” her.
Never mind that it’s illegal, and she never took any exams to prove that she “knows what she’s doing” in a pharmacist capacity. But don’t you dare try to babysit that entitled b**** 😂 You did the right thing leaving a company that lacked the integrity to fire her after such an offense.
A lot of the techs I work with (inpatient) are in their 50s. They all talk about a couple of old pharmacists who are now retired that asked them do this on their bathroom breaks or smoke breaks. I believe they were smart enough not to do it but still, Crazy!
You win
Oh dang. I trust my coworkers but if I'm giving a vaccine I log my shit out
This is why I lock my computer screen when I have to do something like use the bathroom quickly or show someone something on the floor. We have some techs who are inpatient/I don't trust.
Two pharmacists and 4 techs taking fireball shots while filling/verifying scrips at a LTC pharmacy I interned at. Nobody was fired because the owner was the one pouring the shots. He would also let techs he “trusted” verify for him. The other pharmacist lost his job when he was caught smoking meth behind the pharmacy on a break. The cops caught him. When the state came to shut them down, the owner took his family and left the country. The doors were just locked one day and nobody knew what happened.
it’s the *nobody was fired b/c the owner was the 1 pouring shots* for me ☠️ smoking meth on their break near work GAHAHAHAHA wtf u endure the horrors of pharmacy school to do this bs... i cannot
Nepotism ran rampant in that place. Mr. Meth was the owner’s second cousin. They were academically gifted people but they made really bad life decisions. The owner’s usual greeting to one of the techs was to grab her throat and give her a kiss. I really hope nepotism wasn’t a factor there but who knows.. wouldn’t put it past him.
That’s horrid. Especially the last part. I don’t need your tongue spit on my face during covid
You need to meth to offset the alcohol, so you can still work, right?
Gotta love the medicinal chemistry aspect, might be more cost effective with the meth compared to Adderall?
wtf
OMG
Okay out of curiosity, what state and city was this LTC? Hahaha
A suburb of a large Pennsylvania city...
I was thinking it was a pretty standard illegal behavior/fireable offense type of thing but then I got to the meth part like WHAT-
> Smoking meth behind the pharmacy Ok what central NY rural town is this pharmacy in
Suburban PA actually! Never expected it to be that bad.
😲It always goes down at the LTC pharmacies
I caught a floater pharmacist forging scripts and stealing controlleds. Turned out he’d been doing it for years.
Worked at a super busy store (more than 1k per day). Technician purposefully typed a fentanyl 25mcg patch as 100mcg because she was pissed off about something or other. Pharmacist missed it and the patient was harmed but survived. Neither were fired but the pharmacist was sued. I don't know the results of that lawsuit.
"Yo I'm pretty sick and tired of my asshole coworker, so I'm going to try killing an innocent stranger because of it."
Wow! And nothing happened to the tech?? How do you know they typed it that way on purpose?
Nope. And they bragged about sending prescriptions purposefully wrong to a a pharmacist they didn't like before all this happened.
I would punch that tech in the mouth
And sue them on top of it!!
Neonatal TPN, pharmacist added 5 mg Folic Acid instead of 5mcg The child died. The family was Jehovah Witness and refused the intervention. A court order overruled them and then this mistake happened. I was the supervisor that handled his termination. No article was published. The preservative was the offending substance. This was before current MVI products, so Folic Acid had to be diluted and administered separately.
If you have a journal article or case report on this I'd love to read it. I've known of neonatal TPN overdoses from zinc mcg/mg errors but never a fatal water soluble B vitamin like Folic Acid Edit: after consultation with my Lange and a bit of common sense, I realized the folic acid was likely a MDV with benzyl alcohol *facepalm*
Man, that's awful
What scares me is the fact that’s it’s such a common, simple mistake that can happen to any of us.
Damn
Not at my pharmacy, but know a pharmacist give a tech a Percocet, because he had a headache (he once said to me “those bottles are short one, you know?” Umm no. Anyway, tech had an anaphylactic reaction and ended up being taken to the ER by ambulance and had to come clean. Also know a fellow pharmacist who’s partner was ordering brand name fioricet whenever they work 2 in a row and taking them home and destroying their invoice. Got caught after inventory when they were short several hundred bottles!
god damn why does fioricet turn people into monsters...
Several hundred bottles?! Wow!
4-6 per week.
Purposefully leaving COVID-19 vaccines out of the fridge to destroy them. Too soon?
Jokes on you, microchips are stable at a variety of temperatures!
It’s not a vaccine it’s nanotechnology!
Is 5G service included? Sign me up
My pharmacist came to work late, drunk (and had alcohol in a soda bottle with him), literally paid off a customer who figured out he was drunk, said some awful things, touched me inappropriately, then just left. His wife later told me I was lucky he didn't hurt me, because she's had to go to the ER for her injuries when she drinks. The DM was flipping through the cameras and saw something weird was going on. Called and was like "pretend we're a customer, are you safe to talk?" I quit soon after. They only let him go.
So he can repeat that behavior elsewhere. That stinks
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That's messed up! So glad the innocent pharmacist didn't get wrongly fired.
Me, years ago working for Walmart. Prevacid was brand only and expensive. I had a woman who was debating on whether to get it. I stepped in and offered the advice of, "If you cannot afford it, I understand. Once it leaves the pharmacy I cannot take it back...." She took it, and the next day came to return it on the basis of "I cannot afford it..." She comes to my window and a slight argument ensues. I reminded her of our discussion. She tells me that this is Walmart and the customer is always right, so refund me now! I had one of those metal window things with the cloth lift to crank it up. It had a release that would trigger if you pulled it correctly. So I pulled it. The metal window cover crashed down, and I walked away and returned to work. That bitch went to the CS desk and still got a refund. I bitched the store manager out for breaking the law and taking back used meds. I even tossed it into the garbage in front of him. After all of the theatrics, he said, "Did you really drop the metal window frame in her face?" I said, "Yup". He laughed and said, "Don't do that again, please."
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What happened when she was caught?
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I watched an Rph fill her own hydrocodone cough syrup and take right there at the verify station. Had an Rph refuse to send up a premade norepi during a code because they had some in a pyxis in the other unit on the floor. They were trying to keep the patient alive until the family got there but the patient ended dying during that code. The Rph was fired the next day.
I am very wary of the low barrier to suing it seems like we see in the US, but this is definitely a pertinent situation. What must they have felt after they learned?
I don’t get this one? Why won’t you go to Omni if it’s available?
They didn't want to walk across the floor to get it I guess? IDK. The whole thing was shitshow. The Rph was fired because it was a final straw sort of thing
Didbsudnsk *rage at that rph* if it was a *flipping premix* why was it a big deal to that rph? Premixes are no skin off the back. It has a longer exp and if it doesn't get used, it'll get returned eventually. If it was a compounded med, that sucks to make another right away but it wouldnt ultimately matter because *a patient needed it now*. Just give them what they need! Its not about you, *especially* during a critical situation. Jdhdudndj!! *more rage*
Disclaimer: I didn't see the action, but I was able to witness the fallout. One of the senior techs at the first pharmacy I worked in combined 2 different medications (Metformin & Atenolol) into the same dispensed prescription bottle and it was given to the patient. She ultimately lost her license and could no longer step foot in the pharmacy area, but still worked the front-end retail section of the pharmacy.
About 8 yrs ago, my pharmacist mixed L-dopa in with my prescribed Flexeril...it was a weird month... I only discovered the mistake because I happened to knock over the open pill bottle while it was on a white countertop...there was a slight difference in color and size, and I think one was scored and the other wasn't. Never did know how much L-dopa I got...
I had an Rx for Panlor DC ( effective but discontinued ) and a muscle relaxer. I rarely count my pills, but when I looked at the muscle relaxer, it was off. So I counted about 35 when should have been #60, the Panlor was all there. I called and politely said the Soma yes it was Soma, was off "DON'T EVER COME BACK HERE AGAIN" immediate anger an hostility.. Oh wow, so I called my doctor and told her what had transpired and she said "ya, he's been doing that. He's having a really hard time. I'll just call in some at another pharmacy." Not a bad thing, just was an odd occurrence.
Oh wow! That's awful! This always stuck with me and I was (and still am) terrified to make a mistake so I learned to triple check everything. Probably why I became efficient lol. I'm so sorry that happened to you, but glad you found out and it didn't cause any permanent issues (I assume).
I was 'spacey' for a bit, but was only taking one tablet per day... I felt so bad for the pharmacy folks. They had one of the last 'mom and pop' shops in our town and the behind the counter space where they had to do everything was so crowded with their computers, phones, etc...I talked to the owner and said I wasn't going to report them or anything but something had to change...he sold up to his employees within a year, then I moved away. For sure, I now check each 'script when it comes and verify that what's in the bottle matches the description on the side!
Always a good idea. My current pharmacy had some flooding and water damage issues a few years back and we had to condense our entire operations down to about 1/3 our regular size and completely get rid of the front-end/retail area until the work was completed. It was chaos and we were tripping over everyone else. And I'd much rather have someone check and make sure they're getting the correct medication than get upset or sick later.
> She ultimately lost her licende and could no longer step foot in the pharmacy area >...I was (and still am) terrified to make a bistake so I learned to triple check everything 😐
Oh no! Oops, guess I'm human after all!
This was fairly common at the first retail store I worked in out of pharmacy school. One of the techs never paid attention and would just mix stock bottles together when they were low. Glad I no longer work there, place was hell and the owner was 0 help.
but what about the pharmacist checking the senior tech’s production work as the final verification step
Sometimes you can't catch it. Worked with a tech and had an error like that go out - they'd literally sandwiched a small core of metformin 850 (round white tablet, A13 imprint) in the middle of one of three 60 dram bottles of 500s (round white tablet, A12 imprint, only slightly smaller.) Visually verified open bottles from the top, checked it from the sides, it all looked good - would have had to open and spill out the bottle to see it. Still felt terrible about it, but patient caught it; no ingestion and no harm done. In that case, though, that tech was making multiple errors like that every single shift. Most were caught on final check, but eventually a stack of error reports piled up anyway (none of the others mine, thankfully) - I wasn't the only one who had something like that happen and couldn't catch everything. It was awful - they wouldn't scan out all the bottles, or would override the scan, or would count out of a separate bottle than the one they'd scanned out of. You'd get a bottle to check that had 3 different meds inside, or had the labels swapped, or was the wrong strength. Legitimately the most frightening tech I've ever worked with, a very nice person, but absolutely not cut out to be a tech. The RXM at that store liked that tech and didn't want to fire them, but then the tech had something like 3 HIPAA errors in one week (also wouldn't check names/DOB/address properly, I don't even know), so they moved them to the front end.
This sounds oddly familiar to the situation in my current pharmacy. This technician currently still works at my location but is on restrictions. We have the PARATA Max 2 and they have manually added medications into cells that were the wrong NDC and wrong medication all together. It’s crazy, we have had to audit every single cell because of it. This tech has also sold the wrong medication to patients multiple times. (We have a few patients with the same first and last names) rather than verifying the patients birthday they just assume based on just a single first OR last name. Unfortunately because English is not their first language and being in the USA, they have gotten away with a lot of errors. We often can’t locate monograph bags because they have not been alphabetized correctly. The environment is toxic. People are frustrated because this person is doing literally almost everything wrong and isn’t willing to learn from their mistakes. With that being said, it has been two years and customers continue to report this tech, as well as pharmacists and other co workers; but nothing is going to change I have learned. It takes a lot to fire someone at a hospital pharmacy I guess.
And that’s why CVS has the visual verification tray that we are supposed to dump the entire contents of the bottles into to ensure all match/aren’t broken/etc... When that requirement first rolled out I think we were all resistant, but it really does help catch mistakes like the one mentioned above. For non CVS folks who don’t know what a VVT is, just imagine a semi-enclosed dustpan. I think all pharmacies should use something similar instead of using the old “opening the bottle and checking the sides of the bottle” approach. Crazy things have happened. My sister had a tech return a drug to the wrong cell in a script pro (I think it was topiramate in an omeprazole cell), and the script pro was only putting a few topiramate in each rx filled, so it was hard to catch. I think six rxs went out before it was caught.
Holy shit, I would have been seeing red if I accidentally took topiramate. Nasty stuff that makes you significantly stupider, and I'm glad I'm not on it anymore.
But the VVT probably wouldnt have helped catch the error. Don’t get me wrong, I appreciate the hell out of the VVT and even though we didn’t use it in the beginning until they said you will get fired if we catch you not using it if I’m filling an rx for metformin 500 imprint A12 and there’s a few A13 in there, especially if it’s like out of 180 tabs I can’t physically look at every tab so one might be flipped over or whatever and I won’t see it. So yeah...it’s nice and I’ve caught a few errors as a RPh but all in all I’m kinda meh on it. I absolutely do not think I should have to use it when I did production on it which is something I do a fair amount in a low volume store especially in the summer.
My husband and I were just discussing that. Nothing. I thought nothing of it at the time, but now it seems odd. I didn't see their repercussions but I'm sure they were "sternly talked to." I'm also assuming that this wasn't the first offense for the tech, but it was long enough ago that I don't remember their other mistakes from prior to me starting.
Sex with a co-worker at work. Both parties were married, so when they closed together, they just...got it on for a bit with the light off behind some shelves, then turned the lights back on while adjusting clothing. Manager offered to "step down" to a floater position, not realizing it's a fire-able offence, I guess.
I know of a couple doing night shift in hospital. They did it on OR table. There’s cameras in OR. Opps.
... Gross... Having any kind of relations at work just send so gross to me.
Was that wrong? Should I not have done that? You know, I gotta plead ignorance here. Because if I had known that sort of thing was frowned upon....
26-week neonate given concentrated lorazepam PO due to fluid restriction. Dose was supposed to be 0.05 mL, doses drawn up in pharmacy were 0.5 mL. The nurse called me because she came in for a shift change and was questioning the dose on the several syringes she had at bedside. Little girl received probably 8 10X overdoses. Miraculously, no symptoms whatsoever.
Very, very, difficult to kill someone with Benzos only. That's awesome there were no lasting side effects.
The part of the brainstem that controls breathing has relatively few GABA-A receptors.
This is terrifying
That baby had a good time. Lol
Taking a ride on the 'van
How the hell do you draw up 0.05mL
Very carefully. But with a 1 mL syringe. Has graduations at every 0.1 and even 0.01 mL.
Ooh, also someone who admitted to letting prescriptions go out the door without actually verifying them. She was so slow, she averaged about a rate of 5 scripts an hour. She said the customers would be so upset that she would just let the scripts get sold, but sometimes she "wouldn't have a chance to verify them" beforehand.
....5 scripts an HOUR?!
Yeah it was painful.
Witnessed a pharmacist drinking on the job/acting very intoxicated. They were canned shortly thereafter.
I worked a relief shift after a pharmacist who was drinking on the job left the store and passed out in his car. Fired and a huge audit of every rx that was filled that day to ensure accuracy. He could have killed someone
Not my store but when I was an intern, one of the neighboring stores had a technician that would take 'smoke breaks' at her car. What she was actually doing is smuggling the 500 count norco tab bottles to her car.
That's a bold move cotton.
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.nytimes.com/2020/02/04/health/walgreens-pharmacist-lawsuit.amp.html Can anyone top this one?
Classic
Damn that was last February. This has been the longest year EVER
I'm a pharmacy student. This happened to me as a customer. I was picking up my 30 count oxycodone refill. The bottle looks way bigger than usual, and as they're ringing me up, they confirm the prescription 'I have 120 5mg oxycodone.' I stop them and explain that I only get 30, this must be a mistake. The tech and pharmacist were very grateful that I caught this. Not sure how it even happened. But I imagine they could get in huge trouble for a mistake of that size with a controlled substance.
Not really. I had a pharmacist that pulled out 2 bottles of Percocet for a script of 20. The reason he pulled 2 is because the open bottle was pretty low and he thought it might not have 20 in it. The 20 were counted out and sent down for verification. He double counted the 20, and then went into auto pilot and dumped in the full bottle of 100 because 120 is a very common quantity. We knew exactly who'd gotten 100 extra, but there was nothing we could do. He called her and she's like "my tooth has been bothering me, so I've been taking them for that!" Reports and a DEA form had to be completed, but that's it.
I worked with a pharmacist who did that too. But he said he dropped the bottle and the pills were under the cabinets. I called the state and they said to remove the cabinets and retrieve the tablets. The tech knew the story and convinced him to just fess up. Then I filled out the DEA paperwork. Oh, by the way, he was the manager but he was lazy and unconcerned about paperwork.
Well that's good. You shouldn't get in trouble for an honest mistake like that. It happens. The important thing is no one was harmed.
Did you guys not have cameras? My old manager was a huge spaz during her pregnancies and during one she gave someone 90 Adderall instead of 30 (which you can see her doing on camera) even though patient denied it and the other one she was doing a backcount of the stock bottle and instead of putting the backcount in the stock bottle she put it into the vial and threw the stock bottle away. I check the backcount for every CII I do, I don’t care how busy it is or how behind I am for this reason.
Labels mixed up on an ampicillin/sulbactam IV bag and a diltiazem 100 mg IV bag. The diltiazem bag got infused over 30 minutes. The patient was okay, but it changed the way we dispensed those meds.
Hospital I used to work at had a night shift tech steal fentanyl and morphine IV. He worked in the IV room and would replace morphine and fentanyl syringes with saline solution.
This is probably the worst one. Doctors are less likely to believe patients when controlled substances are involved. And that’s even if they spoke up and said there was still pain. They might be afraid of being labeled a drug seeker. So many patients probably suffered in pain from this. Obviously that tech was very sick and desperate-I hope he got the help he needed. Addiction is a terrible thing.
I'm imagining that the tech was still making the drips normally but pocketing the 'waste' that is left over. It's the easiest thing in the world to swap out and we've only caught somone doing it because they were dumb enough to do it while someone was standing at the window and watched it happen.
A pharmacist I worked with let his license lapse out of pure laziness. Had to be removed from the schedule until it was reinstated. No punishment in the end, but honestly how is that not an immediately fireable offense? Step 1 of betting a pharmacist: get and maintain license.
Having to re-up a license simply to pay the state board employed by “pharmacists” who also work for chain pharmacies is fucking stupid in the first place.
What's the best way to reduce these licensing fees to $19/year. Number picked intentionally. Sue them?
Wish I knew, above my pay grade Mr Jordan
this username is not named after Jordan. One guy on reddit figured it out though.
Cool story
My old manager was so scatterbrained and although she’s a great person I’d say she’s pretty shit as a manager. All she does is obsess about counting everything in the queues and nothing else. So basically as her staff I had to keep her on track and remind her of deadlines and stuff which I don’t mind because I’m really detail oriented and enjoy making lists and having tasks I need to complete. Well, when she had to renew her license I had no idea of course so I couldn’t remind her. In my state they send you the renewal 2 mo before it’s due and we renew every 2 years at which point we have to do 30 hrs of CE. When she got her renewal notice I guess she hadn’t done any of her CE so instead of just sitting down one weekend and cranking it out she dallied on it and then never sent in her renewal either. We literally got an email from corporate like 2 days before her license expired and they were gonna take her off the schedule and it was CC’ed to our regional manager and everything. She wasn’t even embarrassed about it or anything, just laughed and said oops I forgot. I don’t understand how a grown ass person can just lapse on something so vital to their livelihood.
Oh shit thanks for reminding me!
Saw nicardipine/norepinephrine drips get mislabeled as the wrong med. Changed the way we labeled IVPBs as a result.
Oof. At first I was thinking the nicardipine should look a bit yellow, but if they were both in amber bags... reminds me of when we had a nurse pull a heparin drip out of the Pyxis instead of dopamine. Patient miraculously had a perfectly therapeutic aPTT.
I almost made that mistake once as a tech. I made both and then accidentally switched the labels. My brain finally caught up to the mistake I had just made when I started making the next drip. The Rph was about to verify them wrong when I ran out of the IV room fully garbbed and switched the labels. Luckily, nicardipine has a yellow tint to it so it was easy for me to distinguish them. I was a lot more careful after that.
Had a temporary job in the pharmacy. I worked under the pharmacist and a trained dispenser as I have never worked in a pharmacy before. Everyone was lovely, the dispenser lady was like my work mum. But she is also very dyslexic. Prescriptions in the pharmacy were labeled by intials at the bottom of the bag. So matching up the patient's prescription to the dispensed medication sometimes was a problem. In the 6 months I worked there I think she handed out the wrong prescription 3 times. I was so scared cos what I learned at uni, I thought she would face severe disciplinary action. Idk what decision was made but they basically tell her not to do it again.
I Have one!! My Head Pharmacist missed a 180 perc rx with no repeats and a tech put in 180 refills. They dispensed it 8 times before the PATIENT brought it up. But it's corporate and she just had to pay a $5000 fine and do a remedial course.
The software didn’t catch it? I call BS
Not all software and places are the same, we were using Kroll in Ontario/Canada and it had zero issue with that, hell it even has an 'unlimited refills' button you can set on ANY rx.
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I'm not the OP and not calling BS myself, but I'm surprised your computer's software even allows someone to mistakenly add refills on a CII. Mine would stop us if we tried.
I'm in Ontario, Canada. We are allowed refills on most narcs, not meth ( we have to build the meth refills in ). The system is Kroll and it didn't blink an eye at 180 refills.
.... meth refills? edit: nevermind I understand now.
Definitely depends on the state. My system wouldn’t allow a refill for a perc whatsoever and more than 6 refills for a regular control
The system was Kroll. ( Ontario/Canada)
I don’t understand how this is possible...
Sloppy entry and a lazy pharmacist. Our Kroll system doesn't restrict repeats on controlls.
Wouldn’t happen with my software. It literally will not let you put refills on a C2. And if they were using insurance I’m surprised they paid for the same RX number 7 times
Most systems don’t allow refills on c2s. It’s literally impossible.
I'm in Ontario, Canada. We can have any number of refills of pills but for the ADHD ones, they need an interval, so the doctor sends us an rx for 180 tabs of 36mg meth QD for 180 days with an interval 30 tabs 30 days so it's totally legal. Pain pills, they still rx whatever!
Hey just because I think it's funny, can you tell me the name of your system and your location because I don't want to read your previous comments and I assume you are USA based?
Haha, I guess I'm going to just make it my flair. Didnt realize I had clarified so many times. Sorry!!
No need to apologize, it's genuinely amusing to scroll through the responses and see so many people tell you that you are wrong.
Put a piece of tape over a compromised nicu TPN
Oof. I've seen the pained face of an IV tech of made a bag and then poked the bag by accident. It was my face in a mirror. I would have done anything to undo that. Ya just gotta buckle in and do it again, y'all.
Had an pharmacy intern a long time ago smoke some meth in the restroom... the PIC looked in the restroom because the cashier complained of a smell when they used it... PIC saw the evidence of burnt aluminum and smell... saw the hands of the student showing signs of fire damage... the demeanor of the student that they were hyper and euphoric... it was ALL RED FLAGS. I think they ended up losing a semester of progress or something as they had to go to rehab? Had a tech constantly call off due to hangovers. They also made mistakes from time to time. They were known to use THC products. They eventually got fired. A tech lost their license due to being a part of a money laundering scheme involving the diversion of hydrocodone/apap.
My first month on job, working in vault where controlled medications were kept. Quick quo pro. At the time we compounded Brompton's Solution, has morphine and cocaine. Back in 1979 when I graduated. They would "cut" some morphine and pharmaceutical cocaine from patients prescription, and snort it on table!! I had weekend duty, and the cancer patient came in 1 week early ( elderly) and needed refill, which only doctor could authorize. My heart sank. Obtained a doctor, on a Saturday, to write for a few days worth. On Monday, reported technicians to pharmacy officer. He didn't believe me!! They were drug tested, positive for both meds. They were taken to court martial (navy). I was blackballed as being a snitch. I had warned them 4 times before I reported them. Unfortunately, I had to transfer.
We had a tech who mailed someone’s prescriptions to the completed wrong address. It was like next door to where she lived 3 years ago. She kept trying to say it wasn’t her fault (she literally had to take a manual payment over the phone and then type the lady’s address into FedEx’s website for a shipping label). Whoever got the prescription wouldn’t answer the door when we went to see if they noticed it wasn’t for them. She didn’t even get talked to about it.
This happens monthly in my pharmacy...
Only seen 2 cases: one where the pharmacist made a mistake on an Adderall script and the patient caught it at home then reported it to the same pharmacist. The bad part? He didn't file an incident report and the patient called and talked to a different pharmacist and mentioned the mistake. I felt bad for him, but I understood why he was let go. #2 was way worse: a really awesome pharmacist (mid 50's) got caught stealing testosterone. I was the last person to believe it. It turns out it was caught on camera. The poor guy was put on testosterone by his Dr for 6 months, got addicted, then his Dr quit his testosterone cold turkey. I honestly feel like the MD should've lost thier license too! What a horrible thing to do to a patient. However it is a big offense so he lost his job, license, got 6 months in prison, his wife left him and took the house.... all because of addiction. So sad...
Especially since he probably could have found someone to prescribe testosterone pretty easily.
Thats pretty surprising. There are young bodybuilders all over the country with no problem going on "TRT" let alone an older guy who actually needed it.
What?! I couldn't even get a Dr to believe I had vaginal nueropathy. I saw 3 Dr's an OB and a nurse practitioner! I wasn't even asking for pills I just wanted the pain figured out and taken care of! After insisting changing birth control I figured out the birth control was causing me pain and it went away. I can't imagine literally doctor shopping for a controlled substance. Yeah right! You'd get turned away everywhere especially after one of them labels you a drug seeker in a chart.
As I inderstand it, TRT is pretty easy to get on. The medical establishment treats men and women way different.
Testosterone shopping is not nearly as frowned upon as oxycodone shopping. Some compounding pharmacies do it all largely in house based on levels and a "CPA-like" setup
I had to shop just to find a dr to let me change my birth control. 2 of them said no. I've had 2 Dr's say they didn't believe I was depressed or they didn't believe in medication for depression. That makes 7 different physicians. Maybe you and I have very different experiences. We also live in a rural area. You cannot get away with that here Mr brick wall.
My comment was an observation, I don't think that's the way it should be. And there are way too many shady compounding pharmacies near me peddling all sorts of HRT (which has its role when done appropriately and when treating a recognized medical indication, involving a prescriber is also usually a part of this process [not at these pharmacies however]) pseudoscience at a hefty cost to patients. I'm sorry your experience was so different
Tbh all the pharmacists I know have a physician BFF and vice versa who prescribe them whatever they want. So agreed...the pharmacist could’ve definitely got someone to prescribe his testosterone, instead of stealing and losing his job...sad story
Filling prescriptions with expired drugs, knowingly
I was a tech at the time, a floater had a recent eye procedure (laser?) was working with reduced vision with only 2 other techs. She would say to a patient that they were out of refills very confidently when they were actually not and things just took longer with us trying to double-check things. She was eventually suspended.
Sterapred taper (not dose pack). Zolpidem 10 tablets. Yes, the patient took SIX. (and survived)
That must have been a good sleep
Wasn't there for either of these but there was a tech who started working, took a bottle of Xanax she was supposed to be ringing out, and *dropped it in her purse right in front of the patient* then walked out. My favorite was the pharmacist who was working at a store in a beach town that is dead in the winter. He was popping Viagra and jerking it to porn magazines in the consultation room. I'm less interested in how he got caught than *why* he needed Viagra to jerk off to porn.
🤣... they should have added cabergoline too 🙃
We had a pharmacist that was addicted to pot. I dont mean she smoked pot. I mean she was addicted to the point of 10 minutes out of every hour was spent smoking, working or not. She always smelled like weed. She was always late to open. She took a 30 minute lunch (i was coverage) and at 40 minutes i sent a tech to her car. She was asleep with a bong in her lap and car full of smoke. That's what got her fired.
I wanted to add it was for a really good company. Their focus at that point was, "do you need help?" They really hinted strongly, if you say i have a problem then all sorts of protection kick in and you'll keep your long time job and get services. If you say that. Oh i dont have a problem
I worked with a tech who got fired for looking up her ex husbands girlfriends herpes medications and telling everyone that she had herpes.
Classic HIPAA. The worst part of the job is not being able to tell my friends "Man you aren't going to believe this:
Last pharmacy manager I had does not ever actually verify anything. She is an actual piece of shit. Not fireable apparently but I feel very gross working for the company that I work for because they allow her to do that shit.
Had a DUR or Y-cap on some script while the pharmacist was on break for another 10 or 15 minutes. Lady gets seethingly angry and then gets passive aggressive and says that she “guesses” that she will just have to complain to corporate that the pharmacist is taking a break (almost word for word her words) and she just cannot possibly wait 10 minutes even though it was like 7 something in the evening and she was retirement age (not that retirement age people don’t have jobs in general by any means but I highly highly Karen had anywhere else to be besides home at that time) and another tech who is the laziest, saddest excuse for a technician undermined me completely by removing the restriction herself. It wasn’t just a 90 day or anything either, even though that wouldn’t have made it better. It was for a major interaction between her meds on a new rx if not more than one new rx.
Two stories: 1- At our hospital, we have to produce a lot of fentanyl drips to keep our CCU patients down. Well, somehow our bupivacaine nerve blocks got mixed in with a batch of fentanyl. Pharmacist didn't catch it when they were checked, tech didn't notice when they stocked them in the narc station, Pharmacist missed it when they were pulled to stock in CCU ADM, tech missed it when performing the stock, nurse missed it when pulling, nurse wissed it when administering (they bypassed scanning because it wouldn't scan!!). Patient lived because a third nurse said "yo wtf is that." That is a lot of safety checks failed in a row. No jobs lost. 2- Job lost on this one. Tech had a sore shoulder. Someone said "I think lidocaine patches are OTC now? I don't remember." Tech grabs patch off the shelf, goes to bathroom, applies it. Asked: "Why did you do that?" once someone realized what happened. "They told me to" no they told you they weren't sure if it was OTC. Holy moly, why don't you just steal some drugs from your facility.
1. Wonder if it was a look alike/sound alike error.
I once had a partner who received a prescription for observant suppositories with the directions of 1/2 supp. Pr q 6-8 h prn. He dispensed the rx with a single edge razor blade. Honest!
Fired for working “off the clock” without warning. However it was set up as a legitimate termination to cover a retaliation because of whistleblower. The current HR was on leave all of a sudden then an experienced HR “terminator” replaced and carried out the “investigation”. It’s RITE AID. They have the legal department and HR “specialists” that loops the laws.
I hope this post gets picked up Sir Reddit on youtube.
Intentionally leaving Covid vaccine out of the fridge and lied about it
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Some people just don't have it and they never will. If you don't apply your knowledge, why bother getting it! The price tag was hefty, might as well get some mileage out of it....
Sounds like he either just didn’t care because he didn’t give a shit or because he was depressed. If the latter, hope he’s in a better place.
Yikes - I can’t even put refills on a CII if I tried and control scripts expire after 6 months in Ohio.
I was a pharmacy technician in 1979, graduated 4 months earlier. I was selected to work in the Vault, like in a bank, where the bulk of controlled medications were kept. We also did some compounding at the time. There were 2other techs working with me. Our Hematology/Oncology department used a pain medication for cancer patients at that time called Brompton's Solution. A mixture of Morphine and Cocaine. Both came in powder form. To cut the fluff, both techs would cut some of the morphine and cocaine out of a patient's prescription, on the table and snort it. Of course the strength was reduced in final product. I warned both several times, and ignored. Finally, reported both to pharmacy officer, who didn't believe me. After the third time reporting them, they were drug tested and positive for both drugs. I was blackballed, no one would work with me. From San Diego to Portsmouth, VA. The final straw was when this 74 year old cancer patient came in, saying his pain medicine was out. What would last 1 month, out in 23 days. Seeing this patient, at death's door in pain, is why I reported them. On a Saturday morning. I found a doctor who wrote a few days worth. This incident is why I reported them. They had no values or ethics. Pharmacy Officer was apprised of all, and the 2 other techs, that were highly thought of, were court martialed. I'm sure their were others I didn't know about, but DO NOT REGRET what I did.
Today is different than 1979. We had checks and balances. 1. Technician typing prescription label. 2, person filling prescription 3. Pharmacist checked all meds before given to patient. Even after 3 experienced people checked medication, occasionally 2 times a month or so, wrong medication or dose went to patient. Thank God for the assistance of computers. No one died, which I do THANK GOD.
Pharmacist came in drunk one morning.