Pharmacy Life in Scotland

I like her. I think she is a keeper. Could we get one a month anyway?

Interesting comment, but my impression is that all prescriptions are ‘free’ to everyone, even those that do pay work and pay additional taxes. If that’s the case, the pharmacist is spending an awful lot of time in anger with everything AND everyone. Or, do some people pay cash for their medications? Who would these people be? Those that don’t work i.e. don’t have income tax nor have additional taxes to pay, or those that bring in vouchers? Or, would it be some other type of alternative arrangement to pay for prescriptions? If all prescriptions are free, surely the national formulary is somewhat limited (i.e. limited choice for prescribers to write for), so wouldn’t it be more simple than in US with setting up prescription bottles for unit-of-use and just pour, slap, lick, and stick, plus freeing up all the time for counseling? If all prescriptions are free for everyone, why doesn’t the government pay pharmacists a salary like a government job? Please, tell more about pharmacist jobs in UK, and what makes filling prescriptions such an unpleasant proposition. Here in US there is simply a hodge-podge of insurances, products, and other non-conforming irritations, that actually doing the job we’re trained for is a continual search for discernment.

To Mary Augustine:
The NHS is based on the principle that those under 16, still in college, have serious medical conditions and over 60 are entitled to free prescriptions…it is not these categories that make me angry. There are a variety of other categories for those that cannot be arsed working, trying to get something for nothing.
Community pharmacists provide private and NHS healthcare, therefore we are not employed as government workers. However, we build contracts with the local NHS boards that allow us to get the money back that we spend in getting the drugs to fill the prescriptions in the first place. My complaint is mainly with the patients that think they are customers, and that they are always right. i didn’t spend 6 years training to be a pill monkey.

@Mary-

If my understanding is correct, a good analogy is people in the US on Medicaid, those too infirm or too poor to afford medication. In the UK, under NHS, most medications have a set price of £6.10. I am pretty sure that is what it is in England. I believe Scotland has their own NHS where it might be different.

Anyways, for those who can’t afford it, get it for free. I do not know the full criteria, but I am sure there is a lot of information on the NHS website .

Cheers!

Appreciate the information. Indeed it does sound like a hodge-podge there, as well, as pharmacists being at a similar point of public onslaught. Why do we pharmacists get ourselves into this jam of having to spend so much time with unhappy, disgruntled (and rude people), stuck in the red tape in getting the right meds to the right person in a timely fashion? Appreciate Angriest for opening up forum to other pharmacists in UK. Is it similar to Canada, as well?

Cool, I like her!! It’s kinda neat to hear about her thoughts on aid LOL!! Please keep posting her :) She sounds like my M-I-L she’s from Ireland ;)

Sniff…. I just don’t get it… Om.. errr… hmmmm…duh… brain fart… NHS is their form of medicaid? Cool people get free scripts there too muhahhahaha

Mary,

in Canada, drug policy is decentralized (meaning every province/territory has their own regulations on prescription drugs). I’m from Ontario and in Ontario the people who are covered under the government are the elderly and those on social services (where I work, the same situation as lil’ Laura, no respect for pharmacists from the ones who get their medication for free). There is also a catastrophic drug plan (Trillium) where people can pay a quarterly deductible if their monthly medical costs are too high (it is $2.00 per script after the deductible is paid). I’m not too sure what the notion is in the US about Canadian health care, but it is only hospital services and doctor visits that are universally covered, but prescription drugs do not fit under this umbrella.

M-I-L? how did you know I was Irish?

Pharmacy Student… Ah yes… ODB… The bane of Ontario pharmacy existance… Imagine having to tell every person over 65 in August that they now have to pay a $100 deductable… I know that’s practically nothing, but it’s amazing how many of them suddenly develop alzheimer’s when it’s time to take out their pocketbooks…

I hear you Carolyn… I’m sure I don’t have to tell you about the ones that don’t want generics because “I have to pay $100.00 and you give me the cheap stuff!”

[...] You can check out Lil’ Laura’s first post here. [...]

Definately a keeper. And I agree with the medicaid comparison to NIH. I deal with medicaid when at the pharmacy and nothing annoys me more when I’ve just filled a boat load of oral diabetes meds and insulin for someone and they come up with a couple of the 2 pound chocolate bars and other candy. I can understand buying one because you need the sugar on hand when you might be hypoglycemic but when you’re in one of those electric carts because you too fat to walk I don’t feel that sorry for you, and especially so when you claim you can’t afford the $1 copays on the brand name only drugs that I know are costing the tax payers alot of money, and you’re walking around with your posse with brand new cell phones, enough gold to think you robbed fort knox, and driving brand new escalades pimped out.

And if people get bent out of shape over the tax rates now, wait till socialized medicine hits them.

To Laura,
MIL means Mother in law, and it’s the way you write that leads me to believe your atleast part Irish :) My mother in law talks the same way you write, only I can hear her accent.

Im pure irish, born and bred mellee!!
Hope that’s not a bad thing!!

Oh no not a bad thing at all!! I am Irish, we rock :)