Current Events > Every single pharmacist I've seen in my life looks stressed and busy as fuck

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What is going on with this occupation

spanky1 posted...

What is going on with this occupation

They are stressed and busy as fuck

Theyre severely short staffing pharmacy technicians. Everyone is overworked and inundated with prescription requests. Also, probably half of the customers have some ridiculous complication with their insurance or payment method which takes several minutes and phone calls to sort out, so lines back up and people get pissed off.

Payzmaykr posted...

Theyre severely short staffing pharmacy technicians. Everyone is overworked and inundated with prescription requests. Also, probably half of the customers have some ridiculous complication with their insurance or payment method which takes several minutes and phone calls to sort out, so lines back up and people get pissed off.

this plus most don't really get paid crap. especially at your big retail place.

if you're talking about retail it's because they're dealing with idiotic customers all day

"just count the pills into a bottle! why does it take longer than 10 seconds?!?"
"i drive here at 80 mph and my doctor said they would call it in, why isn't it ready yet?"
"why are you charging me $50 for this? i have insurance!"

My local pharmacy is always a pretty chill place, so your mileage may vary. This is from the perspective of someone living in a middle-ish class suburb in Australia though.

(my family isnt middle class per se, we just live in a house paid off by my grandfather decades ago by working 16 hours a day across two jobs; you could say we were literally grandfathered in)

Because the people in charge of retail pharmacies are greedy jackasses that don't give a fuck about the pharmacy staff or the patients. It's just money

I will never forget one of the early days at my job when a patient from my old CVS happened to stop by and he goes "Wow you look happy. There's a lot less panic in your eyes!"

Multiple things:

1. pharmacists that work in retail have to deal with rude customers all day. They also have to deal with providers (NP/PAs) who have no idea what they gave and they always have to call back the provider to clarify what dose, drug interactions and hey why are you giving this medication, the patient is already on a different one but same class etc. because they lack basic knowledge of pharmacology. The pharmacist also serves as a safety check so they dont give out medications improperly.
2. retail pharmacists get paid like shit
3. overall heathcare workers are burnt out and quitting anyway

the /r/noctor subreddit is a great source of examples for the above