I can't tell you the number of times that various pharmacies have messed up Joe's prescriptions. That includes CVS as well as Medco Health (mail order) and Accredo (specialized medications).
It is one of the most frustrating things we have to deal with. It is an area of constant vigilance, checking and rechecking, varifying delivery dates, getting tracking numbers, then when the drug arrives, checking for the proper product and dosage.
When Joe started out with ProCrit, I picked up the order from CVS and it was just a bunch of little vials. This is an injectable medication. So I asked jokingly if Joe was supposed to drink the vial because there were no syringes included. They are supposedly a "go-with" item with this medication along with a sharps container, under our prescription plan. The pharmacist's assistant was very annoyed with me for asking this question. She made a whole lot of phone calls and finally got the syringes for me. She gave me the intramuscular syringes instead of the sub-q ones. When I complained about the oversized syringes, she wouldn't help me out. I had to call Joe's doctor and get a hurry-up order called in for the proper size. She knew it was wrong I'm quite sure, and could have corrected it with the prescribing doctor who is in a different city, but she didn't.
Joe is on another speciality med that must be taken exactly when it is supposed to be taken. It is very expensive. We use a special mail pharmacy for that. They decided to do the "just in time" type of delivery. However, it didn't work because they never mailed it out in time, and they didn't send it the fastest way. He had one pill left, and the product was lost somewhere in transit. The nurse at the other end of the line told me that it would be OK for him to be without his medication for several days. It is NOT ok. I let her have it guns a-blazing, called the company pharmacist and let her have it also, and forever after, I have to call them to make sure they do what they are supposed to do. I believe they gave up on the "just-in-time" stuff. They are sending things out sooner now.
Another time a while ago, CVS lost the prescription for Lovenox called in by Joe's heart surgeon. He was scheduled for valve surgery and this was critical. They called the surgeon after hours and got a verbal script, but then didn't have the proper dosage. So they wanted to fill it with a much lower dose, and told me that I could inject him several times with the lower dose and it would be OK. Of course, we all know what that would do to his belly. So I told them to find the product somewhere from another pharmacy, since it was their error. Fortunately they were able to do that. I later found out that a pharmacy assistant answered the surgeon's call line and forgot to enter the order for the Lovenox.
Medco Health Mail-In routinely loses mailed in prescriptions. That is a terrible situation. You don't know they're lost until it is several days into the order and to redo the prescription it will take the same amount of lead time, plus what you have lost from the initial prescription snafu. Trying to get that straightened out on the phone----well- forget about it. Can't be done that way. You have to call your doctor and get another prescription and wait for that, then mail in the new one.
Everyone should be extremely careful with the meds they get. Know your dosage, know how it is to be used and write down what the doctor says about any new medication. And check out each and every script that is due you.
