Voice Mail

I received a call a few weeks ago from a local physician. He was surprised, and dismayed that he had to actually talk to a real live person. He proceeded to question me about why we have no voice mail system for physicians. I explained that we have a separate phone line for physicians (which was the one he called) that rings directly through to the pharmacist - no menus to navigate through etc...

He still wasn't satisfied. More questions followed.

"You mean to tell me you would rather talk to me?" he asked incredulously.

"Well, yes, actually. I prefer to talk to physicians/nurses etc... since it reduces the chance that I won't be able to understand, or misinterpret an order left hastily on the voicemail."

I've worked for one of the big McPharmacy companies - and the voicemail system, while a nice tool when things got really hairy was nothing but headaches. I seemed people just liked to talk really fast and leave off important information - like the prescriber's name. I got tired of people coming in to pick stuff up that couldn't be filled because the person phoning in the order forgot to leave the patient's name. Yea. That really happens. A lot.

Anyway, Dr. Feelgood thought it was ridiculous that I take the time to speak with him...he actually said "but your wasting your time on these phone calls."

Ok. Let's tally up the score here:

1) I have to spend the time listening to the phone regardless of if you are a real live person or not. If your calling in an order, it doesn't take much extra time for me to actually say "Hi" and "Bye" - just about the only extra time consuming information for "live" phone calls.

2) Ensuring accurate orders, with all information needed, is not a waste of time no matter how long it takes.

3) Let's not even talk about how much of my time (and yours) your wasting by even having this conversation.

4) I understand the concern about the physician 'wasting' time on hold waiting for the pharmacist. We go through that all the time waiting on hold to speak to someone at your office. Plus, at our pharmacy, there are no other humans in the pharmacy other than the pharmacist. You will get me each and every time. I promise.

All in all, a simple RX for amoxicillin took about 10 minutes to call in. Wanna talk about wasting time now?

The Coolest Student

I've been found out.

Outed, so to speak.

Well, sort of.

Here at DontCallMeDoc pharmacy, we've been hosting some summer pharmacy rotations. Our latest student managed to figure out DontCallMeDoc was me.

That's OK though, because I've sworn her to secrecy and if she ever talks, I'll tell the world about how she made one of our customers cry...

Yea. Cry.

Actually it wasn't really that big of a deal. This woman cries all the time...sometimes she even starts before she ever gets to our counter....but silly me didn't let my student in on that fact. She handled it admirably though, gotta hand it to her.

So, yea, that's my student story. Seriously though, Cool Student, it was fun...I'll miss ya!

:)