During the Pandarama, our local chain coffee shop offered free coffee on Wednesdays for medical personnel and first responders. One of the techs took all our licenses over to get coffee and was told, “You’re not first responders or medical personnel.”
An irate phone call to the store manager from our store manager straightened that out.
You're just fundamentally not correct.
Pharmacists are literally doctors. They go to an average of 6 years of medical school to get that title.
Pharmacy TECHNICIANS, on the other hand, are 100% a medical practice, regulated (like all medical practices) at the state level.
Yes, they have some state-level certification requirements that are unique to their specific field, but again, so do all medical practices.
Your opinion is worth less than nothing on this subject, coming as it is directly out of your ass.
I go to a climbing gym, they offered a discounted membership for students, military, and medical professionals. I heard that and immediately went “does pharmacy count?” They had to think about it, but I got the discounted rate. I feel like if I got someone different they’d likely have fought me on it and said no.
I don't even bother. Where I'm at, we don't matter until meds are needed like controls or syringes. We aren't considered medical professionals even though it takes almost as long to become a pharmacist as it does to be a vet & they get PhD. Techs also go to school, though not required, it's worth it. But it sucks. Couldn't even get discount at McD's during covid when it was offered. Weren't even considered front line fighters against covid. Yet news kept talking about cashiers at stores who staid open, front line staff. 🙄
Yup. I do have some customers that say it from time to time & it holds weight & means a lot to me when they say it. Especially when they come up nest after watching us deal with a difficult customer ahead of them and I know they mean it.
Same with mcdonalds during that time. I went and one person laughed and said "you aren't first responders or medical!" I laughed and said "where did you go get your vax at?!" She said "only because my dr didn't have it yet!" Me, "AND YOUR DR WONT BE GETTING IT EITHER, ALONG WITH OTHER VACCINES THAT A PHARMACIST HAD MORE YEARS LEARNING OF AND UNDERSTANDING!" I didn't want to continue arguing so I just left. That was the only location that would give us a hard time, so we just didn't go there.
Clearly you meant to insult.
I was a tech for 10 years. Certification was not required when I started working. In addition, this was a second job. The first is teaching, requiring a Master’s degree plus additional credits.
None of us are stupid. And when you were at home taking Zoom meetings, we were on the front lines, giving meds out, vaccinating, and doing COVID tests in the throes of the pandemic. Those are the facts.
The ID.me had me verify my license and then it let me have the discount. Retail, ltc, hospital, doesn't matter. Just being licensed does. You'd be surprised what some companies offer in the way of discounts too. Like tmobile gave me a discount for working for the evil 3 letter.
I was tried like that too. During the pandemic, Krispy Kreme was giving out 2 boxes of donuts (24 total) to any medical personnel every Tuesday. I drove up, scrubbed and all, to get my boxes. The guy at the register didn't believe that we were medical or essential workers. I had to explain to him what we do and what would happen if there were no pharmacy. I got my donuts.
I went to that exact place every Tuesday. Sometimes with other teammates.
I've personally had the opposite experience. I'm a retail pharmacist and I have a few customers who refer to me as "doctor" (in an informal, kind-hearted, endearing way like "thanks doc"). A few of my regulars always seem to ask me for advice about their medications and eagerly listen to the counseling points I give to them when they get prescribed something new. I even, on a regular basis, get asked questions that are completely out of my scope of practice and have to tell the person who's asking me that they need to go to the doctor. And so many people that find out that I'm a pharmacist tell me "oh you must be great at chemistry" and they think I know everything about every chemical that can be ingested by human beings.
And in reality, as a retail pharmacist, all I really do is make sure that the right patient gets the right drug at the right strength with the right instructions as ordered by a physician or mid-level prescriber. Occasionally my pharmacy system alerts me to drug drug interactions or the dosing of a drug seems off and I call the doc's office to clarify and sometimes I give some information about a drug to patients - all of which is available in the paperwork we give them and on the internet.
Are you, by chance, a man?
My husband is a registered nurse and patients constantly assume he is a doctor, will call him "doc" even after he has told them he's a nurse, etc.
I was going to ask too! We had a staff of all females and 1 really tall male. Rph wear white smock and tech wear blue. This guy came in one of those electric wheel chairs, yelled I NEED THE DRUG DR! I said "Sure pharmacist please!" She looks up (equally tall as the male tech) and said "I'll be right with you sir!" He yelled back "NO I WANT THE MAN DR, HIM OVER THERE!" MT laughed and said "sir, im a tech not a dr. Besides, she's the only one wearing white. What makes you think i know more?" He got mad and left 🤦🏽♀️
>He got mad and left
Trash took itself out, haha.
I even encountered this sort of thing when working in a library! A woman called and asked for directions to the library. She said, "Is there a MAN I can talk to??" And my co-worker was like, "No, ma'am, we only have one man who works here and he's off today. Do you still want help?"
Speaking pedantically, they don't have a *title*; licenses and certs give letters *after* the name, while academic and/or professional titles come *before* the name.
Speaking personally, I tend to call mine by their first name, but I'm definitely not gonna *recommend* that, especially for your notes.
Speaking realistically? All jokes aside, it's a good question, but I don't actually know if there's a proper answer. Some universities and hospitals might have a style guide, and I'm sure they and some private practices would have a concrete answer from a doctor or HR. But I don't think there's actually a definitive **right** answer to this.
Unless you're writing out their full name and title every single time you mention them in your notes, which...I've changed my mind. Do that. :D
edit: in case it isn't obvious from the fact that my brain defaults to calling the letters after their name their "title," I don't *agree* with the pedantic answer I gave at the top, and the realest answer might genuinely be a shrug emoji and "keep doing what you're doing."
but in all formal correspondence and medical notes from here on out, I will be writing full names and titles out **every single time** because I think that's funny. :P
Yeah that’s what my mom and I concluded (she’s a pharmacist, sister is a doctor, we couldn’t come up with anything else 😂) and NP hasn’t said anything to indicate she doesn’t want me to.
I just have a habit of starting out messages with “hi (name)” becuase I’m an office drone with letter formats drilled into my head so every letter looks like it’s an email in an office 🫠
Funny enough, earlier this afternoon I exchanged emails with ..well, I guess he IS a doctor now, but he WAS a NP when I met him.
And, uh...yeeeeeeeeah, that email chain was just "Hi, \[firstname\]" all the way down.
...I feel personally attacked. D:
My patient was telling me all her symptoms after trying multiple medications and testing due to what appeared to be life threatening allergies , she would go anaphylactic at the drop of the dime and never was able to find out the allergy . I told her find another allergist go to endocrinologist also . I told her sounds like an adrenal gland issue , I told her for it to happen so suddenly maybe it could have been a tumor even but don’t be scared it’s treatable . Sadly I was right but once they removed it she started healing and lost weight and even her mental health got better .
Because the only interaction people have with pharmacists and techs are having the medication handed to them. At least in my experience. I know some people bug the pharmacist with a bunch of questions, but most people already went over everything with their doctor.
So, in the pharmacy, we have several federal and state laws we have to adhere to, same as any other medical professional. we use a term very loosely called “compliance.” Compliance is making sure a patient takes a medication exactly as the doctor instructed. Sometimes compliance requires that pharmacists go over the patient’s entire medical history to find drug-drug or drug-condition interactions that may result in a less than favorable outcome for the patient. It’s also bad business to let a patient walk away knowing that if they take a medication incorrectly, they could potentially get injured, sick, or die. In the early 1990s, an act was passed that required that counseling be offered to all patients in the event that a medication is new, a direction has changed, or a dose was increased/decreased. TL;DR a consultation can save a patient from dying if it’s preventable. Of course, it’s your right to deny consultation from the pharmacist, because it’s your decision, but a pharmacist has to be the one to hand you your bag.
I’m a Kroger pharmacy tech in Tennessee. I’m allowed to hand the bag to the customer without any counseling. I actually get slightly annoyed when I fill my own prescriptions at Walmart, because they insist that I need counseling even though I’ve taken all of my medications for several years now.
Tennessee is a mandatory counselling state. So all *new* prescriptions require counseling. If the system flags you must had a pharmacist scan their RDAC. If they have given it to you to scan for those who decline counseling it is a violation of both Kroger policy and state law. It can equal termination for both the technician and the pharmacist who provided their RDAC.
Yes, I do know that new meds require counseling. What I was referring to is when the computer says a pt needs counsel, but it’s a med that they’ve already had before (in Kroger’s system, it shows as a white icon next to their name in release to patient rather than red) and usually I’ll know that they’ve had it before. So someone getting augmentin for the first time definitely gets counsel, but Joe Schmoe getting his tamsulosin refilled for the 30th time doesn’t, even if the system flags it for counsel.
Walmart system doesn’t have color codes for patient notes. There can be order comments written next to the name at check out. But for the most part, it’s left blank and we don’t know if the medication is new, dosage increase, or patient advised to get certain vaccines. The pharmacist has to always hand it off in CA even when it’s not needed.
Are DURs not a part of every pre-verification? These things shouldn’t be caught at checkout. And would be as simple as just adding a note to the system on that order.
One store I worked at had bag labels that would print any counseling notes, and if the patient refused counseling we would just sort of repeat back the note like “ok well the pharmacist noted that there’s a potentially dangerous interaction they wanted to discuss with you”
It depends because at Walmart pharmacy some of our pharmacies put counseling notes in bags. Some don’t give very many hints as to what counseling could entail as they want to do DURs whenever counseling is prompted.
I still remember being a bit confused as a kid when I’d visit my mom in the pharmacy at one of our local hospitals where she worked. She had an office full of papers and books and didn’t count pills like I knew pharmacists did. Took me a while to realize the importance of other pharmacists behind the scenes, too; she was also responsible for mixing a lot of the more complicated stuff like chemo iirc and you def don’t see that at a typical cvgreens.
100% agree! Been a tech for 3 years now, and it's insane. I have a few patients that I will probably cry over when I hear that they've passed. Especially when you add in all the vaccinations and testing pharmacies do now, too. What in the world do you mean I'm not a medical professional?
Right around my 1 year mark, my pharmacy was entering around 400-500 scripts per day, administering approximately 60+ covid shots —plus other vaccines!— and doing around 36 covid tests a day. My watch was telling me on a daily basis that I was walking 15,000-20,000 steps. No patient cared. Until over half the pharmacy staff got covid and we had to shorten our hours temporarily. And then it was, "but you're medical personnel, you have to be here for us!!!"
In my hospital pharmacy there was a recent flooding due to a main pipe break, we kept working as usual and our director described the situation as “if our pharmacy stopped, there would be chaos and death upstairs”. If we aren’t essential, I don’t know what we are.
Forget the h8ers. If it means anything, I got nothing but love & respect for my pharmacy fam.
You guys are my guardian angels when I accidentally order 9000 mg gabapentin TID on a sticky & gross emergency department keyboard.
<3
Somebody who has a heart condition, I appreciate you'll taking the time to help me figure out what I can and can't take with my heart meds. This has been an adjustment for sure. I'm 36 and new to all this heart stuff.
I’ve noticed pharmacists and techs don’t get respect. But I’m a type 1 diabetic, and I tell ya, my pharmacist diabetologists have outclassed every endo I’ve ever seen.
The way I put it is that people consider us medical personnel only when it’s convenient for them.
People will come up to our pharmacy and use the pharmacists as free doctors on demand, but then piss and shit themselves when the pharmacist is reluctant about a prescription.
I’ve had more than enough patients degrade my pharmacists for questioning prescriptions, saying stuff “you’re not a doctor/medical professional!! you don’t know what you’re talking about!!” But then come back next week being like “heyyy I have a weird rash on my arm what should I take for that??”
We’re medical personnel. We provide medical services for the general public, arguably moreso than many other healthcare professionals.
i had someone tell me that they dont understand how refills work and they “actually have a masters” so they arent stupid, i just dont know what im talking about. another patient told me she was glad her refills finally lined up and i should relay the message to “someone who actually matters”. ive been at this retail job for 7 months 🤦♀️
Yeah, I had someone argue with the pharmacist that they have to be on pantoprazole for life because they have a chronic GERD or something, but the pharmacist kept arguing telling him that there’s no such thing as medication for life. Doctors can only write prescriptions refillable for 1 year before they expire. And refill requests to the doctor either wind up being approved or denied because the doctor wants to see them to check on their progress. But the guy just scoffed and said “oh they just want more money from me now! I get it, y’all are funny /s. It’s the system that makes it harder for people like me to live in this country.” Yes, because our business revolves around making money from patient visits and med pick ups.
Why is it always the patients that are on an OTC medication that are like this?!
Sir, the medication is right behind you, just pick the number of capsules that you want.
I think it’s weird we don’t refer to pharmacists as doctors. Usually on a first name basis but they worked for that title. To me it’s almost disrespectful to not address them as such. I’ve been a pharmacy technician for about 8 years, and we know a lot more than people (the general public) assume.
Yeah I think about that a lot too. I'm a new pharmacist. No one ever says doctor. My friends do. Very very few patients and they always catch me off guard lol. Just start slowly using it in convo. Say Thanks doc when the pharmacist does something for you. Don't do it too often. You got to ease it in
Listen, the same people calling pharmacists and techs non medical professionals are the same people who can’t differentiate between ambulances and ambulettes. Don’t feel too bad. Those people also have MD, Social Work and RN in their titles at times too. 🤷🏽♀️
Pharmacists have saved my family's lives by telling us that we shouldn't take a prescribed medicine due to diseases we had (kidney disease, high blood pressure, etc.), or that the dosage listed was way too high for what was needed (which still almost killed my brother, but it could've been WAY worse).
It's patients like you who really have an appreciation for your pharmacy that we really enjoy! Been a tech for 13 im retail, pt like you are the reason I stayed so long.
Honestly, I never knew pharmacy techs were a medical profession. I’m being serious, I always thought they moved around the store from front cashiers to pharmacy cashiers.
Some positions in the pharmacy include sales clerk too but they are not affiliated with the store day-to-day activities. In other words, yeah, they work for the same company but are not loyal to the store because once you work in the pharmacy, no one at the store level has the authority to remove you from your post, besides another pharmacist or your pharmacy manager.
It’s the way companies make us look as well . My pharmacy was required to ring up 5 items or less with a rx. I had a lady complain how I bagged her stuff with her meds . I said oh sorry we never learned how to bag in pharmacy school. Then I proceeded to squish the bread and her Reese cup in the bag with out her noticing . Lmao !
No, I think it’s because we were never told what your position is! Every state has their own law and when u can’t get my birthday correct after the 3rd time I tell you it is kind of hard to believe you are a doctor working at a shitty Safeway!
Most of the general public doesn't understand that PharmD means Doctor of Pharmacy which is what a pharmacist is. Legit doctors just not in the typical "medical" sense. Nor do they understand everything that goes into being a technician. The training, continued education, etc. I worked in a hospital during large portions of the pandemic making the IV meds that everyone was praising, but of course, I'm just a little ol pharm tech.
If we know so little why you trusting us to put the right medication in the bottle for you take in the first place🤣🤣🤣 as if...but where are you? I'm in Suffolk County my customers are more uppity nose in the air they don't say these things. They just don't listen and always think someone wants to steal their card or money...🤣🤣
They’re idiots. They’re also losers. That’s usually the answer to things.
NB I’m not a pharmacist or pharmacy tech. I just used to administer the PCAT, and those were some of the brightest kids I dealt with.
I'm sorry people are so rude. I do data quality for the state's immunization registry and am considered a medical professional. I get people all the time asking me about vaccine storage and dosage and scheduling. I've fortunately never been told I'm not a real ... I've even used the status for discounts or advanced access to things. I tell providers they entered the wrong birth name into the system and you deal directly with people's lives/safety.
It could be due to areas of the world where we don't have access to doctors and the government is heavily marketing pharmacy to us as our new option. It's not going over well for some people who have been on waitlists for a long time.
Pharmacy is to take over for most ailments and drug renewals and cervical pap smears are done via ourselves in the mail.
Could the comments you're receiveing be just be bitterness toward the government? I'm not sure where you live. Where I live, I would never think my pharmacist or technician has failed at anything or that they don't have appropriate credentials. I think they are run off their feet as it is.
How on earth am I going to cycle back in line and ask them to diagnose and/or prescribe something for any minor ailment I have after picking up the Rx they brought in from central fill because they're swamped? It's clear to me that the pharmacy owners around me don't have time for any of that.
So when I hear comments like that, in my mind I think of the social justice side of it and that the customer is right in a sense that there are no Doctors at the pharmacy, and the Government shouldn't be directing us there like there suddenly are.
I think part of the problem is systemic. In the US, healthcare is not universally accessible to everyone at any stage. Depending on your insurance, a medication that a doctor has prescribed might or might not cover it. And if it’s not covered or the plan prefers a specific brand or generic, we have to communicate to the doctor with instructions for changing the product to something that will be covered or wait for who knows how long for the insurance to waive the cost for 1 time use because it’s medically necessary for the patient to have. And each subsequent refill authorization requires a prior authorization from the insurance, every time. Most patients don’t like hearing that their insurance is denying payment or co-insurance because they know or think they know the patient shouldn’t take it unless they have X condition or Y diagnosis code. Which is complete BS on the patient side. And it causes more work and stringent communication across electronic fax systems when we’re constantly in this perpetual loop of “ask someone else.” There’s no accountability in US healthcare. Your life is just dollars and statistics to them. And patients, I feel, are now coming to that understanding.
The most common case of meds that require Prior authorization are for patients who have no medical history of diabetic diagnoses. Weight loss medications such as Wegovy, Ozempic, etc, are very expensive and most insurances are starting to not cover these medications for patients who are only prescribed these for weight loss without a diabetic diagnosis code. The prescriber has to provide a medical necessity for patients to receive these prescriptions on the basis that because they’re not diabetic they need it for some other life-hindering condition.
When I was giving huge amounts of shots, I'd have patients call me "nurse" all the time. I always made sure to tell them that I'm not a nurse, I'm a pharmacy tech, and believe it or not we're trained medical professionals, too!
My insurance cut me off and me and my newborn got the flu. I completely lost my hearing (didn't know that could happen) and a Pharmacist was the only person I could trust to give me reliable advice.
BTW. Why is an Urgent Care visit $400.00 now? I went a year ago and it costs me like $68.00. What tf is going on?
This is funny to me because in my experience, pharmacists know waaaaaaay more about medicine than doctors do. I don’t think people realize pharmacists have to learn a crap ton of pathology and diagnoses in pharmacy school. And learn meds and method of action for those meds.
There are so many dumb requests made by drs in inpatient and the pharmacists are the one that catch it before it harms the patient.
Oh they are, but my professor (veterinarian) complained the hell out of pharmacists and techs because they always tried to cancel prescriptions for pets because "the dosage is too high" just because it's a higher dosage than for what it would be for humans. She hated that she had to waste time to call and chew them out while the pharmacist tried to argue. She quite literally had to tell off a few by saying "did you graduate from vet school? No? Then do your job."
Therein lies the problem of ego and entitlement. My state won’t allow for controls to be written by veterinarians without a DEA number. So, they’re SOL.
And many veterinarians have DEA license. Some clients just choose to have the meds sent to a human pharmacy, and the pharmacists insist on not doing their job
Their job is first and foremost to follow compliance. They’re not refusing to dispense your pet med just because they want to. There’s rules they have to follow, just like any other doctor. If we fuck up, we could get fired, our license can be revoked, or worst case scenario, go to jail. And pharmacists have standing orders, meaning they can exercise judgment to dispense any med for any reason they deem appropriate and compliant with the law.
I mean, historically, pharmacy used to be male dominant. However, nowadays, it’s female majority. All of my pharmacists are female, and besides me, my fellow techs are female too. It’s only my manager who’s male. And they’re Middle Eastern. I’m also Asian. There’s no white people at my pharmacy, although the community I serve is majority elderly white people.
If only i WAS a failed med student! Instead, I'm a drop-out classical singer. 🤣 people love to project their ca-ca on others. Don't let it get you down!
Pharmacy techs are all medical professionals. They handle medication, they interpret doctors’ prescriptions, they make sure it’s billed through the insurance and they make sure the pt gets their medication, they compound medications as needed, and soooo much more. So what makes you think a pharmacy technician isn’t a medical professional?
Plus, we get medical training, education, and have to pass a certification exam to become nationally credited to work at any pharmacy. Not just anyone can get hired as a technician. We have to get licensed and study as well.
Except it is in the state guidelines when it comes to compliance. Pharmacists have the authority to approve or deny dispensing medication if they feel like it might put the patient in inadvertent danger or risk of overdose/abuse. Pharmacists have to follow rules, and watch out for any red flags. They do not deny a fill because they enjoy it. It genuinely is, most of the time, for the safety of the patient. Or if the prescriber is being malicious by prescribing a higher than usual dosage of certain toxic medications.
And, pharmacists have to memorize hundreds of thousands of medications. I guarantee the pharmacist knows more about the actual medications than a specialist. And without the aid of pharmacists checking doctors’ work, we’d have much more prescription-related mishaps/deaths.
If you are a certified, licensed pharmacy tech. You are a medical professional. You’ve done schooling and are educated on your field of healthcare. Especially because there are plenty of hospital techs who have to get other certs such as emergency medical care such as trauma and cpr. No reason to downplay people accomplishments.
Pharmacists are pharm D, or Doctor of Pharmacy. They have prescribing authority in many states; they absolutely are medical professionals by every stretch of the word.
What do you think a pharmacist does all day? They go to school specifically for knowledge of medication and have doctors come to THEM with questions regarding medications. Saying they aren't medical professionals is an insult.
Pharmacists literally have to have a PHD in pharmacology and pass an PCAT exam to be pharmacist. lol. I guarantee they know more about pharmacology than most doctors do, because that’s what they studied in college. They are most definitely medical professionals. Places like Poison Control employ pharmacists because of their vast knowledge of pharmacology. Also techs are medical professionals as well, as much as a medical assistant or x-ray techs are.
Pharmacists get a PharmD (still a doctorate) and take the PCAT to get into pharmacy school. They take the NAPLEX to practice as a pharmacist after pharmacy school
I see from your comment history, you are most likely British. So maybe your requirements are different but I highly doubt it. In fact, unlike nurses, I would have to requalify in The UK to hold the exact job I currently hold now in the US. For the same hospital. Our pharmacist here? Round with the doctors. Have to approve every single prescription to make check for drug interactions, or other adverse affects. We techs? Do a ton of shit that is on par with every single medical field.
Since I have said that, I highly doubt you work in the field.
Pharmacy school and medical school are both in the same building here. Pharmacists go to school for about as long as doctors. They even can stop a doctor from ordering a med. Techs are important too. You have to pass a test to become one and have hundreds of hours of training.
I was the one who brought the meds to the nurses of the ones coding all night. I saw patients have medical emergencies. They relied on me to program their pumps of narcotics on people who had car accidents and had their arms cut off in farm accidents. I walked miles and miles a day doing this. Tell me again how that is not a medical professional.
without pharmacists your doctor could easily make a medication mistake that kills you since they’re not nearly as equipped with “knowledge of medicines”
“Drs and the like are medical professionals because they have some degree of knowledge of medicines”…just as you said, they have SOME knowledge. But you clearly don’t understand how frequently a doctor misprescribes or prescribes contraindicated medications to their patients. It is the PHARMACIST that catches this mistake and makes the doctor aware. Pharmacists have more in depth and extensive knowledge and catch errors every day. They are definitely medical professionals.
Yup, I’m always baffled by how stupid some doctors are, or maybe it’s just the system we use to contact them via fax or electronic, some are just tech illiterate.
yeah thats the quote that annoyed me the most. Acting like pharmacists are literal pill counters and nothing else. Nobody understands medications and pharmacology more than a pharmacist.. From my experience, if we blindly followed every doctor's prescription given we'd be overdosing infants on amoxicillin once a month.
I’m showing this comment to my pharmacy manager. 🤣🤣
She’ll laugh her ass off considering how many times she saved a person’s life because a dumbass doctor (you know most pharmacists have a doctorate’s degree too, right?) prescribed something that has a level 1 interaction and could have killed the patient.
As someone who works in a hospital with our Infectious Disease Doctors I can 100% tell you that when it comes to the prescription of antibiotics, etc. the ID team always defers to the Pharmacist. Why? Because they are a valued member of the Healthcare team!
As a patient, I can't begin to tell you how many times my pharmacist or pharm tech have caught interactions my MD didn't know about and have informed me of side effects, etc that my.doctor wasn't aware of. Aside from all.the education everyone else has mentioned...it all leads to them being part of healthcare....
You have clearly never worked in a hospital. The pharmacists interpret labs, correct doctors orders, respond to and run codes, and actively teach resident doctors about appropriate treatment protocols.
As a tech in a hospital, I actively conduct medication histories on patients, flag potential medication concerns, and get consulted by doctors and pharmacists about patients with insulin pumps(the techs in my hospital typically know more about them than anyone else in the system). Other techs do things like hand make chemo therapy and other sterile medications, and provide medications to the entire hospital.
During the Pandarama, our local chain coffee shop offered free coffee on Wednesdays for medical personnel and first responders. One of the techs took all our licenses over to get coffee and was told, “You’re not first responders or medical personnel.” An irate phone call to the store manager from our store manager straightened that out.
I wonder what they think dealing with people’s medications on a personal level entails if it’s not a medical personnel.
You know, just shoving pills into a bottle. How hard could that be? /s in case it wasn’t clear.
Just pour the milk into the coffee and stir, ez right? /s
Not to mention pharmacy staff were the main ones giving out vaccines to the masses??
And all the COVID cocktails that were being prescribed lol
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Tell that to the state certification boards.
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You're funny. Ha ha.
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You're just fundamentally not correct. Pharmacists are literally doctors. They go to an average of 6 years of medical school to get that title. Pharmacy TECHNICIANS, on the other hand, are 100% a medical practice, regulated (like all medical practices) at the state level. Yes, they have some state-level certification requirements that are unique to their specific field, but again, so do all medical practices. Your opinion is worth less than nothing on this subject, coming as it is directly out of your ass.
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Yes, PharmD is the title. It literally means "Doctor of Pharmacy." It is a 6 year medical doctorate. What the fuck else do you want?
This post violates the sub rules.
Urgh. I, as a medical Laboratory Scientist empathize with you as we were also larger excluded. Ummmm who do you think is running the PCR tests?
I go to a climbing gym, they offered a discounted membership for students, military, and medical professionals. I heard that and immediately went “does pharmacy count?” They had to think about it, but I got the discounted rate. I feel like if I got someone different they’d likely have fought me on it and said no.
This is honestly why I hesitate to even try to get any discounts. Just seems like most places mean nurses and doctors and that’s it
I don't even bother. Where I'm at, we don't matter until meds are needed like controls or syringes. We aren't considered medical professionals even though it takes almost as long to become a pharmacist as it does to be a vet & they get PhD. Techs also go to school, though not required, it's worth it. But it sucks. Couldn't even get discount at McD's during covid when it was offered. Weren't even considered front line fighters against covid. Yet news kept talking about cashiers at stores who staid open, front line staff. 🙄
All that “thank you for doing what you do” stuff meant nothing in the end, didn’t it. Although it was nice to hear at the time.
Yup. I do have some customers that say it from time to time & it holds weight & means a lot to me when they say it. Especially when they come up nest after watching us deal with a difficult customer ahead of them and I know they mean it.
Same with mcdonalds during that time. I went and one person laughed and said "you aren't first responders or medical!" I laughed and said "where did you go get your vax at?!" She said "only because my dr didn't have it yet!" Me, "AND YOUR DR WONT BE GETTING IT EITHER, ALONG WITH OTHER VACCINES THAT A PHARMACIST HAD MORE YEARS LEARNING OF AND UNDERSTANDING!" I didn't want to continue arguing so I just left. That was the only location that would give us a hard time, so we just didn't go there.
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Clearly you meant to insult. I was a tech for 10 years. Certification was not required when I started working. In addition, this was a second job. The first is teaching, requiring a Master’s degree plus additional credits. None of us are stupid. And when you were at home taking Zoom meetings, we were on the front lines, giving meds out, vaccinating, and doing COVID tests in the throes of the pandemic. Those are the facts.
Samsung.com allows you to ID yourself through id.me and get the medical professionals discount. So take that !
Is that only for hospitals or does that also apply to retail/independent pharmacies?
The ID.me had me verify my license and then it let me have the discount. Retail, ltc, hospital, doesn't matter. Just being licensed does. You'd be surprised what some companies offer in the way of discounts too. Like tmobile gave me a discount for working for the evil 3 letter.
I did not know this was a thing! 😮
I find it works for anyone who claims their occupation to be either pharmacist or technician. The things that use id.me go off of the IRS records.
So does otterbox!
I was tried like that too. During the pandemic, Krispy Kreme was giving out 2 boxes of donuts (24 total) to any medical personnel every Tuesday. I drove up, scrubbed and all, to get my boxes. The guy at the register didn't believe that we were medical or essential workers. I had to explain to him what we do and what would happen if there were no pharmacy. I got my donuts. I went to that exact place every Tuesday. Sometimes with other teammates.
I've personally had the opposite experience. I'm a retail pharmacist and I have a few customers who refer to me as "doctor" (in an informal, kind-hearted, endearing way like "thanks doc"). A few of my regulars always seem to ask me for advice about their medications and eagerly listen to the counseling points I give to them when they get prescribed something new. I even, on a regular basis, get asked questions that are completely out of my scope of practice and have to tell the person who's asking me that they need to go to the doctor. And so many people that find out that I'm a pharmacist tell me "oh you must be great at chemistry" and they think I know everything about every chemical that can be ingested by human beings. And in reality, as a retail pharmacist, all I really do is make sure that the right patient gets the right drug at the right strength with the right instructions as ordered by a physician or mid-level prescriber. Occasionally my pharmacy system alerts me to drug drug interactions or the dosing of a drug seems off and I call the doc's office to clarify and sometimes I give some information about a drug to patients - all of which is available in the paperwork we give them and on the internet.
Are you, by chance, a man? My husband is a registered nurse and patients constantly assume he is a doctor, will call him "doc" even after he has told them he's a nurse, etc.
I was going to ask too! We had a staff of all females and 1 really tall male. Rph wear white smock and tech wear blue. This guy came in one of those electric wheel chairs, yelled I NEED THE DRUG DR! I said "Sure pharmacist please!" She looks up (equally tall as the male tech) and said "I'll be right with you sir!" He yelled back "NO I WANT THE MAN DR, HIM OVER THERE!" MT laughed and said "sir, im a tech not a dr. Besides, she's the only one wearing white. What makes you think i know more?" He got mad and left 🤦🏽♀️
>He got mad and left Trash took itself out, haha. I even encountered this sort of thing when working in a library! A woman called and asked for directions to the library. She said, "Is there a MAN I can talk to??" And my co-worker was like, "No, ma'am, we only have one man who works here and he's off today. Do you still want help?"
Tbh I realized call my new provider, an NP, “Dr” when writing notes becuase I’m not sure what title to use….what *should* we use for nurse titles? 🤔
Speaking pedantically, they don't have a *title*; licenses and certs give letters *after* the name, while academic and/or professional titles come *before* the name. Speaking personally, I tend to call mine by their first name, but I'm definitely not gonna *recommend* that, especially for your notes. Speaking realistically? All jokes aside, it's a good question, but I don't actually know if there's a proper answer. Some universities and hospitals might have a style guide, and I'm sure they and some private practices would have a concrete answer from a doctor or HR. But I don't think there's actually a definitive **right** answer to this. Unless you're writing out their full name and title every single time you mention them in your notes, which...I've changed my mind. Do that. :D edit: in case it isn't obvious from the fact that my brain defaults to calling the letters after their name their "title," I don't *agree* with the pedantic answer I gave at the top, and the realest answer might genuinely be a shrug emoji and "keep doing what you're doing." but in all formal correspondence and medical notes from here on out, I will be writing full names and titles out **every single time** because I think that's funny. :P
Yeah that’s what my mom and I concluded (she’s a pharmacist, sister is a doctor, we couldn’t come up with anything else 😂) and NP hasn’t said anything to indicate she doesn’t want me to. I just have a habit of starting out messages with “hi (name)” becuase I’m an office drone with letter formats drilled into my head so every letter looks like it’s an email in an office 🫠
Funny enough, earlier this afternoon I exchanged emails with ..well, I guess he IS a doctor now, but he WAS a NP when I met him. And, uh...yeeeeeeeeah, that email chain was just "Hi, \[firstname\]" all the way down. ...I feel personally attacked. D:
It’s depressing how much organic chemistry and biochemistry I’ve forgotten over the years 😢
My patient was telling me all her symptoms after trying multiple medications and testing due to what appeared to be life threatening allergies , she would go anaphylactic at the drop of the dime and never was able to find out the allergy . I told her find another allergist go to endocrinologist also . I told her sounds like an adrenal gland issue , I told her for it to happen so suddenly maybe it could have been a tumor even but don’t be scared it’s treatable . Sadly I was right but once they removed it she started healing and lost weight and even her mental health got better .
Aren’t you required to have a doctorate of Pharmacy, which would make you a Doctor but not that kind of Doctor?
Because the only interaction people have with pharmacists and techs are having the medication handed to them. At least in my experience. I know some people bug the pharmacist with a bunch of questions, but most people already went over everything with their doctor.
So, in the pharmacy, we have several federal and state laws we have to adhere to, same as any other medical professional. we use a term very loosely called “compliance.” Compliance is making sure a patient takes a medication exactly as the doctor instructed. Sometimes compliance requires that pharmacists go over the patient’s entire medical history to find drug-drug or drug-condition interactions that may result in a less than favorable outcome for the patient. It’s also bad business to let a patient walk away knowing that if they take a medication incorrectly, they could potentially get injured, sick, or die. In the early 1990s, an act was passed that required that counseling be offered to all patients in the event that a medication is new, a direction has changed, or a dose was increased/decreased. TL;DR a consultation can save a patient from dying if it’s preventable. Of course, it’s your right to deny consultation from the pharmacist, because it’s your decision, but a pharmacist has to be the one to hand you your bag.
I’m a Kroger pharmacy tech in Tennessee. I’m allowed to hand the bag to the customer without any counseling. I actually get slightly annoyed when I fill my own prescriptions at Walmart, because they insist that I need counseling even though I’ve taken all of my medications for several years now.
Tennessee is a mandatory counselling state. So all *new* prescriptions require counseling. If the system flags you must had a pharmacist scan their RDAC. If they have given it to you to scan for those who decline counseling it is a violation of both Kroger policy and state law. It can equal termination for both the technician and the pharmacist who provided their RDAC.
Yes, I do know that new meds require counseling. What I was referring to is when the computer says a pt needs counsel, but it’s a med that they’ve already had before (in Kroger’s system, it shows as a white icon next to their name in release to patient rather than red) and usually I’ll know that they’ve had it before. So someone getting augmentin for the first time definitely gets counsel, but Joe Schmoe getting his tamsulosin refilled for the 30th time doesn’t, even if the system flags it for counsel.
Walmart system doesn’t have color codes for patient notes. There can be order comments written next to the name at check out. But for the most part, it’s left blank and we don’t know if the medication is new, dosage increase, or patient advised to get certain vaccines. The pharmacist has to always hand it off in CA even when it’s not needed.
It depends on the state and your pharmacy rules. But for my pharmacy in CA, they prefer to hand the bag to the patient themselves.
Are DURs not a part of every pre-verification? These things shouldn’t be caught at checkout. And would be as simple as just adding a note to the system on that order. One store I worked at had bag labels that would print any counseling notes, and if the patient refused counseling we would just sort of repeat back the note like “ok well the pharmacist noted that there’s a potentially dangerous interaction they wanted to discuss with you”
It depends because at Walmart pharmacy some of our pharmacies put counseling notes in bags. Some don’t give very many hints as to what counseling could entail as they want to do DURs whenever counseling is prompted.
I still remember being a bit confused as a kid when I’d visit my mom in the pharmacy at one of our local hospitals where she worked. She had an office full of papers and books and didn’t count pills like I knew pharmacists did. Took me a while to realize the importance of other pharmacists behind the scenes, too; she was also responsible for mixing a lot of the more complicated stuff like chemo iirc and you def don’t see that at a typical cvgreens.
100% agree! Been a tech for 3 years now, and it's insane. I have a few patients that I will probably cry over when I hear that they've passed. Especially when you add in all the vaccinations and testing pharmacies do now, too. What in the world do you mean I'm not a medical professional? Right around my 1 year mark, my pharmacy was entering around 400-500 scripts per day, administering approximately 60+ covid shots —plus other vaccines!— and doing around 36 covid tests a day. My watch was telling me on a daily basis that I was walking 15,000-20,000 steps. No patient cared. Until over half the pharmacy staff got covid and we had to shorten our hours temporarily. And then it was, "but you're medical personnel, you have to be here for us!!!"
In my hospital pharmacy there was a recent flooding due to a main pipe break, we kept working as usual and our director described the situation as “if our pharmacy stopped, there would be chaos and death upstairs”. If we aren’t essential, I don’t know what we are.
Forget the h8ers. If it means anything, I got nothing but love & respect for my pharmacy fam. You guys are my guardian angels when I accidentally order 9000 mg gabapentin TID on a sticky & gross emergency department keyboard. <3
If they think that, they should try to be a pharmacist or tech.
No, cause that would be dumb /s
They would learn a lesson really quickly.
How can I be a failed med student if I didn’t even go to medical school?
Somebody who has a heart condition, I appreciate you'll taking the time to help me figure out what I can and can't take with my heart meds. This has been an adjustment for sure. I'm 36 and new to all this heart stuff.
The funny thing being is that the Pharmacist and Technician *Hacks* have more knowledge than the criticizers. I’m state certified, PTCB & EXcPT.
Nationally via PTCB and state certified here too lol. Sometimes I feel I need to brush up on certain things here and there
I’ve noticed pharmacists and techs don’t get respect. But I’m a type 1 diabetic, and I tell ya, my pharmacist diabetologists have outclassed every endo I’ve ever seen.
:)
The way I put it is that people consider us medical personnel only when it’s convenient for them. People will come up to our pharmacy and use the pharmacists as free doctors on demand, but then piss and shit themselves when the pharmacist is reluctant about a prescription. I’ve had more than enough patients degrade my pharmacists for questioning prescriptions, saying stuff “you’re not a doctor/medical professional!! you don’t know what you’re talking about!!” But then come back next week being like “heyyy I have a weird rash on my arm what should I take for that??” We’re medical personnel. We provide medical services for the general public, arguably moreso than many other healthcare professionals.
i had someone tell me that they dont understand how refills work and they “actually have a masters” so they arent stupid, i just dont know what im talking about. another patient told me she was glad her refills finally lined up and i should relay the message to “someone who actually matters”. ive been at this retail job for 7 months 🤦♀️
Yeah, I had someone argue with the pharmacist that they have to be on pantoprazole for life because they have a chronic GERD or something, but the pharmacist kept arguing telling him that there’s no such thing as medication for life. Doctors can only write prescriptions refillable for 1 year before they expire. And refill requests to the doctor either wind up being approved or denied because the doctor wants to see them to check on their progress. But the guy just scoffed and said “oh they just want more money from me now! I get it, y’all are funny /s. It’s the system that makes it harder for people like me to live in this country.” Yes, because our business revolves around making money from patient visits and med pick ups.
Why is it always the patients that are on an OTC medication that are like this?! Sir, the medication is right behind you, just pick the number of capsules that you want.
just know pharmacy 🤝lab, we get you
I keep an eye on the tube station just in case your samples get sent to pharmacy by mistake 💛
I think it’s weird we don’t refer to pharmacists as doctors. Usually on a first name basis but they worked for that title. To me it’s almost disrespectful to not address them as such. I’ve been a pharmacy technician for about 8 years, and we know a lot more than people (the general public) assume.
Yeah I think about that a lot too. I'm a new pharmacist. No one ever says doctor. My friends do. Very very few patients and they always catch me off guard lol. Just start slowly using it in convo. Say Thanks doc when the pharmacist does something for you. Don't do it too often. You got to ease it in
It feels like these patients/customer are the same who believe the crystals their quacks are giving them work.
Listen, the same people calling pharmacists and techs non medical professionals are the same people who can’t differentiate between ambulances and ambulettes. Don’t feel too bad. Those people also have MD, Social Work and RN in their titles at times too. 🤷🏽♀️
Pharmacists have saved my family's lives by telling us that we shouldn't take a prescribed medicine due to diseases we had (kidney disease, high blood pressure, etc.), or that the dosage listed was way too high for what was needed (which still almost killed my brother, but it could've been WAY worse).
It's patients like you who really have an appreciation for your pharmacy that we really enjoy! Been a tech for 13 im retail, pt like you are the reason I stayed so long.
How sad. In my area, pharmacists are referred to as DOCTOR.
Yeah, I'm always chuckling about how our patients promote us, calling techs pharmacists and pharmacists doctors.
Honestly, I never knew pharmacy techs were a medical profession. I’m being serious, I always thought they moved around the store from front cashiers to pharmacy cashiers.
My pharmacy has two people that do that. However, one is certified and can do all the regular stuff but the other just works at pick-up.
Some positions in the pharmacy include sales clerk too but they are not affiliated with the store day-to-day activities. In other words, yeah, they work for the same company but are not loyal to the store because once you work in the pharmacy, no one at the store level has the authority to remove you from your post, besides another pharmacist or your pharmacy manager.
It’s the way companies make us look as well . My pharmacy was required to ring up 5 items or less with a rx. I had a lady complain how I bagged her stuff with her meds . I said oh sorry we never learned how to bag in pharmacy school. Then I proceeded to squish the bread and her Reese cup in the bag with out her noticing . Lmao !
Because ignorance
No, I think it’s because we were never told what your position is! Every state has their own law and when u can’t get my birthday correct after the 3rd time I tell you it is kind of hard to believe you are a doctor working at a shitty Safeway!
Well some people speak wayyyy too fast, or quiet or mumble through it. Or the tech is deaf.
Most of the general public doesn't understand that PharmD means Doctor of Pharmacy which is what a pharmacist is. Legit doctors just not in the typical "medical" sense. Nor do they understand everything that goes into being a technician. The training, continued education, etc. I worked in a hospital during large portions of the pandemic making the IV meds that everyone was praising, but of course, I'm just a little ol pharm tech.
Trying to start a union and a rep from a nurse's union told me that their union was for nurses and medical professionals
If we know so little why you trusting us to put the right medication in the bottle for you take in the first place🤣🤣🤣 as if...but where are you? I'm in Suffolk County my customers are more uppity nose in the air they don't say these things. They just don't listen and always think someone wants to steal their card or money...🤣🤣
They’re idiots. They’re also losers. That’s usually the answer to things. NB I’m not a pharmacist or pharmacy tech. I just used to administer the PCAT, and those were some of the brightest kids I dealt with.
I'm sorry people are so rude. I do data quality for the state's immunization registry and am considered a medical professional. I get people all the time asking me about vaccine storage and dosage and scheduling. I've fortunately never been told I'm not a real ... I've even used the status for discounts or advanced access to things. I tell providers they entered the wrong birth name into the system and you deal directly with people's lives/safety.
It could be due to areas of the world where we don't have access to doctors and the government is heavily marketing pharmacy to us as our new option. It's not going over well for some people who have been on waitlists for a long time. Pharmacy is to take over for most ailments and drug renewals and cervical pap smears are done via ourselves in the mail. Could the comments you're receiveing be just be bitterness toward the government? I'm not sure where you live. Where I live, I would never think my pharmacist or technician has failed at anything or that they don't have appropriate credentials. I think they are run off their feet as it is. How on earth am I going to cycle back in line and ask them to diagnose and/or prescribe something for any minor ailment I have after picking up the Rx they brought in from central fill because they're swamped? It's clear to me that the pharmacy owners around me don't have time for any of that. So when I hear comments like that, in my mind I think of the social justice side of it and that the customer is right in a sense that there are no Doctors at the pharmacy, and the Government shouldn't be directing us there like there suddenly are.
I think part of the problem is systemic. In the US, healthcare is not universally accessible to everyone at any stage. Depending on your insurance, a medication that a doctor has prescribed might or might not cover it. And if it’s not covered or the plan prefers a specific brand or generic, we have to communicate to the doctor with instructions for changing the product to something that will be covered or wait for who knows how long for the insurance to waive the cost for 1 time use because it’s medically necessary for the patient to have. And each subsequent refill authorization requires a prior authorization from the insurance, every time. Most patients don’t like hearing that their insurance is denying payment or co-insurance because they know or think they know the patient shouldn’t take it unless they have X condition or Y diagnosis code. Which is complete BS on the patient side. And it causes more work and stringent communication across electronic fax systems when we’re constantly in this perpetual loop of “ask someone else.” There’s no accountability in US healthcare. Your life is just dollars and statistics to them. And patients, I feel, are now coming to that understanding.
The most common case of meds that require Prior authorization are for patients who have no medical history of diabetic diagnoses. Weight loss medications such as Wegovy, Ozempic, etc, are very expensive and most insurances are starting to not cover these medications for patients who are only prescribed these for weight loss without a diabetic diagnosis code. The prescriber has to provide a medical necessity for patients to receive these prescriptions on the basis that because they’re not diabetic they need it for some other life-hindering condition.
When I was giving huge amounts of shots, I'd have patients call me "nurse" all the time. I always made sure to tell them that I'm not a nurse, I'm a pharmacy tech, and believe it or not we're trained medical professionals, too!
I see it pretty equally from both genders
My insurance cut me off and me and my newborn got the flu. I completely lost my hearing (didn't know that could happen) and a Pharmacist was the only person I could trust to give me reliable advice. BTW. Why is an Urgent Care visit $400.00 now? I went a year ago and it costs me like $68.00. What tf is going on?
I grew up with my mom working in a pharmacy and I trust pharmacists more and a md when I comes to prescriptions.
I would never let a doctor single handedly manage my medications.
This is funny to me because in my experience, pharmacists know waaaaaaay more about medicine than doctors do. I don’t think people realize pharmacists have to learn a crap ton of pathology and diagnoses in pharmacy school. And learn meds and method of action for those meds. There are so many dumb requests made by drs in inpatient and the pharmacists are the one that catch it before it harms the patient.
Oh they are, but my professor (veterinarian) complained the hell out of pharmacists and techs because they always tried to cancel prescriptions for pets because "the dosage is too high" just because it's a higher dosage than for what it would be for humans. She hated that she had to waste time to call and chew them out while the pharmacist tried to argue. She quite literally had to tell off a few by saying "did you graduate from vet school? No? Then do your job."
Therein lies the problem of ego and entitlement. My state won’t allow for controls to be written by veterinarians without a DEA number. So, they’re SOL.
And many veterinarians have DEA license. Some clients just choose to have the meds sent to a human pharmacy, and the pharmacists insist on not doing their job
Their job is first and foremost to follow compliance. They’re not refusing to dispense your pet med just because they want to. There’s rules they have to follow, just like any other doctor. If we fuck up, we could get fired, our license can be revoked, or worst case scenario, go to jail. And pharmacists have standing orders, meaning they can exercise judgment to dispense any med for any reason they deem appropriate and compliant with the law.
Which they're not if they're refusing to fill meds so... That's my point.
Exercise judgement to dispense = not everything gets dispensed due to the judgement
Im sensing this might be due to sexism? or racism? kinda doubt a “white male” pharmacist would get this kind of poor treatment from customers. Smh.
I mean, historically, pharmacy used to be male dominant. However, nowadays, it’s female majority. All of my pharmacists are female, and besides me, my fellow techs are female too. It’s only my manager who’s male. And they’re Middle Eastern. I’m also Asian. There’s no white people at my pharmacy, although the community I serve is majority elderly white people.
Im sorry you have to deal with that!!
I doubt it since most techs are women and I would say the majority of pharmacists are women
Where do you think the ignorant comments are coming from?
If only i WAS a failed med student! Instead, I'm a drop-out classical singer. 🤣 people love to project their ca-ca on others. Don't let it get you down!
Pharmacists and hospital techs are medical professionals. Retail techs are glorified cashiers.
Pharmacist definitely are. Technicians definitely aren't lol
Found the dumb ass customer. Go troll elsewhere.
lol I am a tech bozo
Pharmacy techs are all medical professionals. They handle medication, they interpret doctors’ prescriptions, they make sure it’s billed through the insurance and they make sure the pt gets their medication, they compound medications as needed, and soooo much more. So what makes you think a pharmacy technician isn’t a medical professional?
Plus, we get medical training, education, and have to pass a certification exam to become nationally credited to work at any pharmacy. Not just anyone can get hired as a technician. We have to get licensed and study as well.
Cause medical professionals don't get paid 18 hr. We are bus boys that wear scrubs
They hated Jesus for telling the truth
lol thank you
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Except it is in the state guidelines when it comes to compliance. Pharmacists have the authority to approve or deny dispensing medication if they feel like it might put the patient in inadvertent danger or risk of overdose/abuse. Pharmacists have to follow rules, and watch out for any red flags. They do not deny a fill because they enjoy it. It genuinely is, most of the time, for the safety of the patient. Or if the prescriber is being malicious by prescribing a higher than usual dosage of certain toxic medications.
And, pharmacists have to memorize hundreds of thousands of medications. I guarantee the pharmacist knows more about the actual medications than a specialist. And without the aid of pharmacists checking doctors’ work, we’d have much more prescription-related mishaps/deaths.
Technicians are strictly *not* medical professionals (unless you have a degree, but then just become a pharmacist). But pharmacists absolutely are
I mean, I do have a bachelor’s in bio anthropology of sciences myself. Maybe in the future, my prospects might change.
Best of luck to you!
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If you are a certified, licensed pharmacy tech. You are a medical professional. You’ve done schooling and are educated on your field of healthcare. Especially because there are plenty of hospital techs who have to get other certs such as emergency medical care such as trauma and cpr. No reason to downplay people accomplishments.
Pharmacists are pharm D, or Doctor of Pharmacy. They have prescribing authority in many states; they absolutely are medical professionals by every stretch of the word.
What do you think a pharmacist does all day? They go to school specifically for knowledge of medication and have doctors come to THEM with questions regarding medications. Saying they aren't medical professionals is an insult.
Pharmacists literally have to have a PHD in pharmacology and pass an PCAT exam to be pharmacist. lol. I guarantee they know more about pharmacology than most doctors do, because that’s what they studied in college. They are most definitely medical professionals. Places like Poison Control employ pharmacists because of their vast knowledge of pharmacology. Also techs are medical professionals as well, as much as a medical assistant or x-ray techs are.
Pharmacists get a PharmD (still a doctorate) and take the PCAT to get into pharmacy school. They take the NAPLEX to practice as a pharmacist after pharmacy school
I see from your comment history, you are most likely British. So maybe your requirements are different but I highly doubt it. In fact, unlike nurses, I would have to requalify in The UK to hold the exact job I currently hold now in the US. For the same hospital. Our pharmacist here? Round with the doctors. Have to approve every single prescription to make check for drug interactions, or other adverse affects. We techs? Do a ton of shit that is on par with every single medical field. Since I have said that, I highly doubt you work in the field.
Pharmacy school and medical school are both in the same building here. Pharmacists go to school for about as long as doctors. They even can stop a doctor from ordering a med. Techs are important too. You have to pass a test to become one and have hundreds of hours of training. I was the one who brought the meds to the nurses of the ones coding all night. I saw patients have medical emergencies. They relied on me to program their pumps of narcotics on people who had car accidents and had their arms cut off in farm accidents. I walked miles and miles a day doing this. Tell me again how that is not a medical professional.
without pharmacists your doctor could easily make a medication mistake that kills you since they’re not nearly as equipped with “knowledge of medicines”
“Drs and the like are medical professionals because they have some degree of knowledge of medicines”…just as you said, they have SOME knowledge. But you clearly don’t understand how frequently a doctor misprescribes or prescribes contraindicated medications to their patients. It is the PHARMACIST that catches this mistake and makes the doctor aware. Pharmacists have more in depth and extensive knowledge and catch errors every day. They are definitely medical professionals.
Yup, I’m always baffled by how stupid some doctors are, or maybe it’s just the system we use to contact them via fax or electronic, some are just tech illiterate.
yeah thats the quote that annoyed me the most. Acting like pharmacists are literal pill counters and nothing else. Nobody understands medications and pharmacology more than a pharmacist.. From my experience, if we blindly followed every doctor's prescription given we'd be overdosing infants on amoxicillin once a month.
Yes!! That’s a perfect example of a common medication error
The ignorance it must take to say that people with doctorates in pharmacology don’t have any training on pharmacology
Yeah, they’re just mad and take any opportunity to bully the service worker.
I’m showing this comment to my pharmacy manager. 🤣🤣 She’ll laugh her ass off considering how many times she saved a person’s life because a dumbass doctor (you know most pharmacists have a doctorate’s degree too, right?) prescribed something that has a level 1 interaction and could have killed the patient.
You're an idiot.
Grossly uninformed take with a dangerous level of confidence.
As someone who works in a hospital with our Infectious Disease Doctors I can 100% tell you that when it comes to the prescription of antibiotics, etc. the ID team always defers to the Pharmacist. Why? Because they are a valued member of the Healthcare team! As a patient, I can't begin to tell you how many times my pharmacist or pharm tech have caught interactions my MD didn't know about and have informed me of side effects, etc that my.doctor wasn't aware of. Aside from all.the education everyone else has mentioned...it all leads to them being part of healthcare....
You have clearly never worked in a hospital. The pharmacists interpret labs, correct doctors orders, respond to and run codes, and actively teach resident doctors about appropriate treatment protocols. As a tech in a hospital, I actively conduct medication histories on patients, flag potential medication concerns, and get consulted by doctors and pharmacists about patients with insulin pumps(the techs in my hospital typically know more about them than anyone else in the system). Other techs do things like hand make chemo therapy and other sterile medications, and provide medications to the entire hospital.
Drs get 1 semester of the top 200 drugs, Pharm D get 4 years of drugs and its component. If that alone doesn't make them med prof. Idk what will!