Mrs. Subtle: You are so fucking sexy in that red shirt you're wearing.
MPT: *crickets*
*click*
Yes, it was subtle. A few moments later, the same person called again, this time the other tech answered. The woman asked about me again, but then proceeded to tell the tech what she would do if I were single.
She was told not to call again.
This on the heels of a client who owed money, insulted everyone in the pharmacy, and showed up demanding an apology today.
Yes, it's been an odd day.
Needless to say, even if I wasn't in a happy relationship, I wouldn't give the solicitation a second thought seeing as the clients here are mentally unstable.
So thanks, but no thanks.
Wednesday, May 16, 2012
Tuesday, May 15, 2012
Hiding Mental Illness
Mental illness is a funny thing.
I've seen any number of people come in here who look like normal people. They talk friendly enough, and seem like they don't have much of an issue. In fact, in looking at them, they don't appear to have a reason to be coming here.
When you look in their note review however, the story is drastically different.
Some have dependency issues but keep them fairly well-hidden. Others have rage issues. Some are paranoid and think everyone is out to get them. And some do really hear voices telling them to hurt themselves.
The trick for some is to appear normal out in public. These are the people you see walking around in the mall, looking like they are the happiest people in the world. The people you see sitting in a restaurant with their significant other, having a lovely little conversation.
Seem blissful don't they?
Chances are, looks are truly deceiving. Over the last few months, I've taken the time to look at various people's notes to get an idea of what kind of client they are and to see if it's possible to tell what their issue is just from how they appear when they sit in the waiting area.
Granted, some are obvious. They walk around in circles aimlessly, have full-blown conversations with themselves, go from happy to angry in the time it takes to blink, and have panic attacks out of the blue. In some cases, it is easy to tell who has an issue and who doesn't.
One client who was sitting in here looked calm and well-kept. When I looked in their history, I saw a history of paranoia along with a poor relationship with both their mother, brother, and 18 year-old child. The client was afraid that their family was going to turn their child against them if things continued the way they were going.
Another note talked about someone who was convinced that their significant other was cheating on them while working at a bar. In the course of the relationship, there had been several fights, most of them ending with fisticuffs and the possibility of charges being brought.
What it shows is that some can be completely out of whack, out of touch with reality, or have some kind of serious mental issue, but when out in a public setting, can appear to have no problmes whatsoever.
There really isn't much depth to this entry though. It was just something I noticed and felt like posting since I hadn't written in a while.
To follow up my last post where I talk about growth, the pharmacy has continued to grow month to month, although we seem to have consistent issues with whoever the part-time pharmacist is here.
The first one is now the full-time pharmacist, the last one was fresh out of school and apparently this wasn't what he was looking for, and the current one seems to have issues remembering things and understanding what we're telling her.
Oh, and there's the issue of her not completing her CE in time.
I guess 3 years isn't enough time for some.
I've seen any number of people come in here who look like normal people. They talk friendly enough, and seem like they don't have much of an issue. In fact, in looking at them, they don't appear to have a reason to be coming here.
When you look in their note review however, the story is drastically different.
Some have dependency issues but keep them fairly well-hidden. Others have rage issues. Some are paranoid and think everyone is out to get them. And some do really hear voices telling them to hurt themselves.
The trick for some is to appear normal out in public. These are the people you see walking around in the mall, looking like they are the happiest people in the world. The people you see sitting in a restaurant with their significant other, having a lovely little conversation.
Seem blissful don't they?
Chances are, looks are truly deceiving. Over the last few months, I've taken the time to look at various people's notes to get an idea of what kind of client they are and to see if it's possible to tell what their issue is just from how they appear when they sit in the waiting area.
Granted, some are obvious. They walk around in circles aimlessly, have full-blown conversations with themselves, go from happy to angry in the time it takes to blink, and have panic attacks out of the blue. In some cases, it is easy to tell who has an issue and who doesn't.
One client who was sitting in here looked calm and well-kept. When I looked in their history, I saw a history of paranoia along with a poor relationship with both their mother, brother, and 18 year-old child. The client was afraid that their family was going to turn their child against them if things continued the way they were going.
Another note talked about someone who was convinced that their significant other was cheating on them while working at a bar. In the course of the relationship, there had been several fights, most of them ending with fisticuffs and the possibility of charges being brought.
What it shows is that some can be completely out of whack, out of touch with reality, or have some kind of serious mental issue, but when out in a public setting, can appear to have no problmes whatsoever.
There really isn't much depth to this entry though. It was just something I noticed and felt like posting since I hadn't written in a while.
To follow up my last post where I talk about growth, the pharmacy has continued to grow month to month, although we seem to have consistent issues with whoever the part-time pharmacist is here.
The first one is now the full-time pharmacist, the last one was fresh out of school and apparently this wasn't what he was looking for, and the current one seems to have issues remembering things and understanding what we're telling her.
Oh, and there's the issue of her not completing her CE in time.
I guess 3 years isn't enough time for some.
Wednesday, January 11, 2012
holy moly
It's been a minute since I wrote in here.
It isn't for lack of material. Anyone who works in a pharmacy knows there isn't a lack of material, ever.
In the last few months we've had our share of WTF moments.
Some of it is relationship-based. I am the type who'd rather spend time with their significant other rather than sit in front of a keyboard. Some of it is related to my computer going down the toilet a couple months ago. Some of it is being busier at work the last couple of months.
Yes, the little independent pharmacy where I reside has grown significantly in the last few months.
I'm convinced some of it is just because of the simple change that took place in late August. My previous head pharmacist, well she meant well, but she wasn't able to provide the type of leadership and stability that this little operation needed. In steps our current head pharmacist, and things are much more organized, much more structured.
They're just much, much better.
Of course, now the challenge becomes trying to break our newbie of some of the things he learned in pharmacy school. He has yet to completely understand that what they teach and what actually goes on are often two very different things.
In short, he's intelligent, but he lacks what we know as pharmacy common sense.
In the short time he's been here, he's questioned whether an allergy issue has been raised or not on a medication that the patient had been taking for months, questioned a dose that someone else had been on for over a year, and pretty much anything else he sees that goes beyond what is typically recommended.
This would be fine and all except we warned him he'd see things that aren't common or go beyond what is normally prescribed. We told him that he would have to adapt on the fly. He assured us he had retail experience and that he would be able to adjust.
I could spend the next several paragraphs detailing how opposite everything has been from what we thought we were getting, but frankly, I've vented enough about him as is. What I do know is the crap needs to stop soon before something bad happens. I understand wanting to follow proper procedures and all, but real life rarely follows procedure. You can be the smartest person in the world, but still be a bad pharmacist.
**Sidebar**
I worked with a girl for a few years as a tech who decided she wanted to be a pharmacist. Intelligence was never her issue, but she gave true meaning to all the blonde stereotypes you've heard over the years. She's pretty much about the glitz and has pretty much been the type of person who annoys me greatly. Anything her company wants its pharmacies to do, she follows blindly, no matter what. Every program, every phone call, everything. As a result, she's moving up the ladder fairly quickly, but she'd drive me crazy. I'm glad that I don't work in her store, well, the store she used to have as she's moving on.
In short, she's the type who knows a lot, but doesn't apply common sense to the equation. I'm happy she's made it where she has, but maybe it's just me, but she was awfully annoying to work with the few times she filled in at my store.
**End**
The main point is pharmacy isn't just about what interacts with what and is the dose too high. It's about what works for the patient within the legal limits.
The thing I've seen sometimes is a pharmacist thinking they're smarter than the doctor. Look, I'll take a pharmacist's side in a lot of things, and there are some doctors where I do wonder, but generally, the doctor knows what they're doing. It's one thing to ask why something is being prescribed, a different thing if you're trying to tell the doctor what they should do.
All I'm saying is it makes me wonder what they're teaching in pharmacy school more than ever. Are they being realistic? Or are they presenting students with what an ideal pharmacy operates like, rather than what reality dictates?
It seems to me that it isn't an accurate representation of what a normal pharmacy looks like.
In any case, one of the more interesting things to watch is Walgreens being involved with another spat with an insurance company, this time Express Scripts. Some will remember a few years ago they stopped taking (or were denied depending on the version of the story you received) Medical Mutual (processed by Medco). Some said Walgreens didn't like the dispensing fee that was offered, while a different story I heard was that Walgreens got caught with its hand in the cookie jar (in other words, improperly billing items) and Medco smacked it. Hard.
Regardless, the story going around is that Walgreens refused to take the cut that Express Scripts tried to push on them and thus let the contract expire without renewing. Some are lauding Walgreens for taking a stand against an insurance company, but to me it's a slippery slope. While insurances do drive me nuts generally (and have notoriously tried to squeeze pharmacies at every turn), it's easy to forget they're trying to make a profit as well as pharmacies (and there's no disputing that the larger retail chains took in a massive profit last year). So while they make me crazy, they are still a business trying to make money.
In short, there's a lot of concern within the pharmacy industry about reimbursement. One blog pointed out most major pharmacies make their money off brand name drugs and that the number of big name brand drugs is dwindling quickly. Very few are left any more and there isn't anything coming down the line to offset all the new generics coming out for the aforementioned big name brand drugs.
Independents tend to get hurt most in situations like this. They are the ones who get squeezed hardest by insurances just because they don't have the clout that a CVS or Walgreens has. They can't just sit up and say "we won't take your insurance then" and then cover their ass with the other plans they do take. If an independent loses a carrier, it's possible to lose a significant chunk of what little business they do have.
It's a slippery slope.
For now, a place like where I work is going to be okay. A majority of our business comes from people on welfare and right now, aside from Medicaid branching back off again into managed care providers, things are relatively stable. The spat between Walgreens and Express Scripts is nothing more than something to amuse us when we get bored.
Here, life is relatively good.
Let's hope it stays that way.
It isn't for lack of material. Anyone who works in a pharmacy knows there isn't a lack of material, ever.
In the last few months we've had our share of WTF moments.
Some of it is relationship-based. I am the type who'd rather spend time with their significant other rather than sit in front of a keyboard. Some of it is related to my computer going down the toilet a couple months ago. Some of it is being busier at work the last couple of months.
Yes, the little independent pharmacy where I reside has grown significantly in the last few months.
I'm convinced some of it is just because of the simple change that took place in late August. My previous head pharmacist, well she meant well, but she wasn't able to provide the type of leadership and stability that this little operation needed. In steps our current head pharmacist, and things are much more organized, much more structured.
They're just much, much better.
Of course, now the challenge becomes trying to break our newbie of some of the things he learned in pharmacy school. He has yet to completely understand that what they teach and what actually goes on are often two very different things.
In short, he's intelligent, but he lacks what we know as pharmacy common sense.
In the short time he's been here, he's questioned whether an allergy issue has been raised or not on a medication that the patient had been taking for months, questioned a dose that someone else had been on for over a year, and pretty much anything else he sees that goes beyond what is typically recommended.
This would be fine and all except we warned him he'd see things that aren't common or go beyond what is normally prescribed. We told him that he would have to adapt on the fly. He assured us he had retail experience and that he would be able to adjust.
I could spend the next several paragraphs detailing how opposite everything has been from what we thought we were getting, but frankly, I've vented enough about him as is. What I do know is the crap needs to stop soon before something bad happens. I understand wanting to follow proper procedures and all, but real life rarely follows procedure. You can be the smartest person in the world, but still be a bad pharmacist.
**Sidebar**
I worked with a girl for a few years as a tech who decided she wanted to be a pharmacist. Intelligence was never her issue, but she gave true meaning to all the blonde stereotypes you've heard over the years. She's pretty much about the glitz and has pretty much been the type of person who annoys me greatly. Anything her company wants its pharmacies to do, she follows blindly, no matter what. Every program, every phone call, everything. As a result, she's moving up the ladder fairly quickly, but she'd drive me crazy. I'm glad that I don't work in her store, well, the store she used to have as she's moving on.
In short, she's the type who knows a lot, but doesn't apply common sense to the equation. I'm happy she's made it where she has, but maybe it's just me, but she was awfully annoying to work with the few times she filled in at my store.
**End**
The main point is pharmacy isn't just about what interacts with what and is the dose too high. It's about what works for the patient within the legal limits.
The thing I've seen sometimes is a pharmacist thinking they're smarter than the doctor. Look, I'll take a pharmacist's side in a lot of things, and there are some doctors where I do wonder, but generally, the doctor knows what they're doing. It's one thing to ask why something is being prescribed, a different thing if you're trying to tell the doctor what they should do.
All I'm saying is it makes me wonder what they're teaching in pharmacy school more than ever. Are they being realistic? Or are they presenting students with what an ideal pharmacy operates like, rather than what reality dictates?
It seems to me that it isn't an accurate representation of what a normal pharmacy looks like.
In any case, one of the more interesting things to watch is Walgreens being involved with another spat with an insurance company, this time Express Scripts. Some will remember a few years ago they stopped taking (or were denied depending on the version of the story you received) Medical Mutual (processed by Medco). Some said Walgreens didn't like the dispensing fee that was offered, while a different story I heard was that Walgreens got caught with its hand in the cookie jar (in other words, improperly billing items) and Medco smacked it. Hard.
Regardless, the story going around is that Walgreens refused to take the cut that Express Scripts tried to push on them and thus let the contract expire without renewing. Some are lauding Walgreens for taking a stand against an insurance company, but to me it's a slippery slope. While insurances do drive me nuts generally (and have notoriously tried to squeeze pharmacies at every turn), it's easy to forget they're trying to make a profit as well as pharmacies (and there's no disputing that the larger retail chains took in a massive profit last year). So while they make me crazy, they are still a business trying to make money.
In short, there's a lot of concern within the pharmacy industry about reimbursement. One blog pointed out most major pharmacies make their money off brand name drugs and that the number of big name brand drugs is dwindling quickly. Very few are left any more and there isn't anything coming down the line to offset all the new generics coming out for the aforementioned big name brand drugs.
Independents tend to get hurt most in situations like this. They are the ones who get squeezed hardest by insurances just because they don't have the clout that a CVS or Walgreens has. They can't just sit up and say "we won't take your insurance then" and then cover their ass with the other plans they do take. If an independent loses a carrier, it's possible to lose a significant chunk of what little business they do have.
It's a slippery slope.
For now, a place like where I work is going to be okay. A majority of our business comes from people on welfare and right now, aside from Medicaid branching back off again into managed care providers, things are relatively stable. The spat between Walgreens and Express Scripts is nothing more than something to amuse us when we get bored.
Here, life is relatively good.
Let's hope it stays that way.
Tuesday, November 29, 2011
the trouble with mental illness, part 3
I've written plenty about mental illness in here.
I've written how people with mental illness aren't understood and often don't get the support that they should because there's a stigma attached to it. I've written about how some are in situations that compound the situation even more than it already is.
The situations I've mentioned involve people already getting help. What about those who might need it, but aren't getting it?
I'm fairly certain there are a lot of people in this world who need some kind of help but aren't getting it either because they can't, they don't want to, or refuse to admit they have a problem.
Some of these people worry that if they are diagnosed even with just mild depression, that those they care about will abandom them. Or they worry that they will be looked upon differently, so they keep their issues to themselves. Some worry that they'll lose their job because they might be considered crazy.
That seems to be the biggest stigma. Too many people attach crazy with depression when that's not the case. How many times have you heard someone say they aren't going to a therapist/psychologist/doctor because it means they're crazy? I know at least in movies that's mentioned a lot and I have heard it a few times in my life. Someone probably should go, but they won't because it implies they're crazy.
Thus a big segment of people don't go to get help they might need.
Some turn to "alternative" forms of medicine to cope. In other words, they drink or do drugs. I dated a girl once who claimed the only time she felt "normal" was when she was drinking. In the end, it was because the alcohol was calming her nerves, but she was a mean person when she drank and thus made me not want to be around her. Problem was she never wanted to stop drinking and I didn't want to give up on her even though there was little I could do.
Most use drugs to escape because they can't cope with the real world. Some people avoid doing things because of how it makes them feel. I'll never forget watching the MTV True Life show on anxiety. There was one guy who could not drive across a bridge at all. It didn't matter how long or short the bridge was, he couldn't drive across it. Every day, they'd show him talking about how today was the day he was going to do it, yet every day he would avoid it. Another woman was OCD about cleaning. If she saw even the smallest piece of dust in a room, she'd clean the room from one end to the other without stopping no matter what she was supposed to be doing.
These people refused to get help because they didn't want to lose friends or family because of the stigma attached with the idea of going to see someone about it. They didn't want to be thought of as crazy. Instead they tried to find ways to avoid the things that made them anxious or depressed.
Of course, it's a problem. Instead of trying to find a way to treat the problem, they avoid things and never get the help they probably need.
Denial is the worst though.
They can't even admit that they have a problem, they just sit and act like everyone else is crazy or constantly dispute that there's an issue and it goes back to the stigma that is attached to any kind of mental problem.
Eventually it catches up to them though and they either have to face the issue or they completely lose the battle.
It just makes me sad to sit and think a lot of people don't get help because of what they're afraid it will do to them. I understand when people can't afford it because let's face it: without insurance, it's not cheap to try and get help. Even at my primary job, which specializes in mental health, it can be costly if you don't have insurance.
Ultimately though it seems the biggest deterrents are the stigma of people possibly thinking someone's crazy and/or lack of support from friends and family.
That said, how much of a friend are they then if they won't support you when you try to get help? How much does someone love you if they try to convince you nothing's wrong with you?
And what does this have to do with pharmacy?
The last question is easy. How many of you work in a pharmacy where the mental health/anxiety medications are your fastest movers? I'm willing to bet most pharmacies would qualify. I know both pharmacies I work in have mental health medications as some of their fastest movers.
What it comes down to is if someone's struggling, they need to know that someone, even if it's just one person, is there for them and will support them as they try and get better.
They need to know that the person treating them is going to be there for them, talk to them when needed, and do whatever they can to help them get better no matter what.
Finally, they need to know that the pharmacy will work with the doctor to make sure the right medications get prescribed for the patient.
Mental illness will never go away. But we can do what we can to make it easier for those who deal with it.
I've written how people with mental illness aren't understood and often don't get the support that they should because there's a stigma attached to it. I've written about how some are in situations that compound the situation even more than it already is.
The situations I've mentioned involve people already getting help. What about those who might need it, but aren't getting it?
I'm fairly certain there are a lot of people in this world who need some kind of help but aren't getting it either because they can't, they don't want to, or refuse to admit they have a problem.
Some of these people worry that if they are diagnosed even with just mild depression, that those they care about will abandom them. Or they worry that they will be looked upon differently, so they keep their issues to themselves. Some worry that they'll lose their job because they might be considered crazy.
That seems to be the biggest stigma. Too many people attach crazy with depression when that's not the case. How many times have you heard someone say they aren't going to a therapist/psychologist/doctor because it means they're crazy? I know at least in movies that's mentioned a lot and I have heard it a few times in my life. Someone probably should go, but they won't because it implies they're crazy.
Thus a big segment of people don't go to get help they might need.
Some turn to "alternative" forms of medicine to cope. In other words, they drink or do drugs. I dated a girl once who claimed the only time she felt "normal" was when she was drinking. In the end, it was because the alcohol was calming her nerves, but she was a mean person when she drank and thus made me not want to be around her. Problem was she never wanted to stop drinking and I didn't want to give up on her even though there was little I could do.
Most use drugs to escape because they can't cope with the real world. Some people avoid doing things because of how it makes them feel. I'll never forget watching the MTV True Life show on anxiety. There was one guy who could not drive across a bridge at all. It didn't matter how long or short the bridge was, he couldn't drive across it. Every day, they'd show him talking about how today was the day he was going to do it, yet every day he would avoid it. Another woman was OCD about cleaning. If she saw even the smallest piece of dust in a room, she'd clean the room from one end to the other without stopping no matter what she was supposed to be doing.
These people refused to get help because they didn't want to lose friends or family because of the stigma attached with the idea of going to see someone about it. They didn't want to be thought of as crazy. Instead they tried to find ways to avoid the things that made them anxious or depressed.
Of course, it's a problem. Instead of trying to find a way to treat the problem, they avoid things and never get the help they probably need.
Denial is the worst though.
They can't even admit that they have a problem, they just sit and act like everyone else is crazy or constantly dispute that there's an issue and it goes back to the stigma that is attached to any kind of mental problem.
Eventually it catches up to them though and they either have to face the issue or they completely lose the battle.
It just makes me sad to sit and think a lot of people don't get help because of what they're afraid it will do to them. I understand when people can't afford it because let's face it: without insurance, it's not cheap to try and get help. Even at my primary job, which specializes in mental health, it can be costly if you don't have insurance.
Ultimately though it seems the biggest deterrents are the stigma of people possibly thinking someone's crazy and/or lack of support from friends and family.
That said, how much of a friend are they then if they won't support you when you try to get help? How much does someone love you if they try to convince you nothing's wrong with you?
And what does this have to do with pharmacy?
The last question is easy. How many of you work in a pharmacy where the mental health/anxiety medications are your fastest movers? I'm willing to bet most pharmacies would qualify. I know both pharmacies I work in have mental health medications as some of their fastest movers.
What it comes down to is if someone's struggling, they need to know that someone, even if it's just one person, is there for them and will support them as they try and get better.
They need to know that the person treating them is going to be there for them, talk to them when needed, and do whatever they can to help them get better no matter what.
Finally, they need to know that the pharmacy will work with the doctor to make sure the right medications get prescribed for the patient.
Mental illness will never go away. But we can do what we can to make it easier for those who deal with it.
Friday, November 18, 2011
can I help you
"You made a mistake."
Anyone who's worked in any retail job has heard that line at some point.
Sometimes it's "I don't think this is right," or "were you born stupid, or did you become that way with time?" Sometimes it's even "You fucking moron" or "I hope you die."
Before you even know what the problem is, you're being accused of a litany of things and the demand being made to fix the problem that you don't know about. You then spend the next 15 minutes of your life trying to piece together what the problem is, often realizing it had nothing to do with your department.
Sometimes, it's not even a mistake, it's just a matter of the customer not understanding what's going on. In pharmacy, it's usually a matter of them wanting a specific brand and you not carrying it or being allowed to dispense it, or their insurance not covering something or only allowing so many pills.
Yes, sometimes we made a mistake. We filled it wrong, or billed it wrong, or miscounted the number of pills.
This isn't about whether we are capable of making a mistake or not. This is about how the way you approach someone determines the level of service you get.
Now some might say it shouldn't matter. The customer is always right so you should do what you can to fix the situation. Well, several years in retail have taught me that the customer is very rarely right and in fact usually has no clue what's going on. The truth also is no matter how level-headed you claim to be, when someone comes up to in a piss-poor mood, human nature kicks in.
It's hard to be nice to people who are being complete jerks to you. It's as simple as that. Sure, management tells you to just put on a happy face and trudge through it, but it's not that easy to do, especially if you have one after another that's complaining about what happened. It's even worse when it's not actually your fault.
Why am I ranting about this? I haven't had any particularly bad experiences lately, but feel the need to post this simply because I've seen a lot of people posting on my cell phone's community page complaining about the level of service they've received and how crappy they are and the phones suck. I suppose I have trouble believing it's that bad because my girlfriend and I between us have never had trouble with them and when a phone did go wonky, the situation was resolved quickly.
After reading through a bunch of the complaints and the way people described the problem they were having, I have to say I'd be pretty crabby with them too. More often than not, those trying to help the person complaining have to ask them to clarify the problem because it's so vague or poorly written. Other times, you realize it's just because they don't understand how the phone works.
More often than not, unsatisfactory customer service complaints are because the service wasn't very good. But what isn't mentioned is the attitude brought towards the person trying to help you. When I have a problem, I'm nice until given a reason otherwise (ask insurances about how I can get). If you seem to be trying to solve the problem, I'll continue to play nice. Give me unnecessary attitude and I'll get snippy back, but usually I'll just request to speak to a supervisor.
Unless you're an insurance company. I'm liable to hang up on your ass if you're not assisting me properly.
By properly, I mean blaming the software when the reality is you have no clue why I'm getting a rejection and you actually didn't go and ask anyone what it meant, you just sat and finished putting up your post on Facebook complaining about your job for the 37th time that week. If you don't know, just tell me you don't know and pass me on to someone who might know.
In terms of my cell phone company, I know I'm biased. I've been with them for over 8 years and have had virtually no problems with them. When my phone took a swim, they replaced it. When one of the next phones starting turning off repeatedly, they replaced it. When the phone after that took a couple of jumps out of my hand, they replaced it even though I was the one who damaged it. When my most recent phone went restart crazy? Yup, replaced it.
Simply put, the kind of service you get often depends on how you approach the person helping you. Granted, this isn't always true. Sometimes there are just people who hate their lives and everyone around them so they really don't care. They just want to collect their check and go without earning it. I get that, but it's not a majority of people and if you're not happy with the service, you can always move on to a supervisor.
If you go in kicking and screaming, both parties are going to end up bruised and dissatisfied. It's why when I always used to walk away when I dated a girl who's idea of being helped was to immediately give a cashier attitude if something didn't go how she wanted to go. She was the type who'd refuse to leave the line until she was "properly" helped, which meant how she wanted to be helped.
Having worked in retail for years, I'm not quite as brash. I realize that mistakes are made and sometimes cashiers are put in a tough spot. The last thing I'm going to do is yell at someone for something that probably wasn't their fault.
I also realize that sometimes people are just snakebit. You get a product, it doesn't work, you exchange it, it still doesn't work, they give you a different one, that doesn't work either. I'd get frustrated too. In that case, maybe it's time to move on and try a different line.
One complaint that stood out was the couple that was changing service providers. They were unhappy with who they had so they were switching. They had their phone numbers ported over and thought everything was good until they received a bill from their former carrier. They complained, but to no avail. The reason why they received a bill? They didn't notify their former carrier they were switching.
That's the type of thing that makes me smack my hand in my face. Do you really think any company is going to just stop billing you because you decide to walk away without saying so? Hell, some will keep billing you even if you do notify them because you didn't notify them properly. Then you'd be right to be mad. But in this case? It's on you to let them know you're canceling.
In the end, it's like anything else in life. You get out of it what you put into it. If you're bullish and mean from the start, the person on the other end of the phone is likely going to be combative. If you're friendly, they'll be more receptive to your problem.
Give it a try sometime.
Anyone who's worked in any retail job has heard that line at some point.
Sometimes it's "I don't think this is right," or "were you born stupid, or did you become that way with time?" Sometimes it's even "You fucking moron" or "I hope you die."
Before you even know what the problem is, you're being accused of a litany of things and the demand being made to fix the problem that you don't know about. You then spend the next 15 minutes of your life trying to piece together what the problem is, often realizing it had nothing to do with your department.
Sometimes, it's not even a mistake, it's just a matter of the customer not understanding what's going on. In pharmacy, it's usually a matter of them wanting a specific brand and you not carrying it or being allowed to dispense it, or their insurance not covering something or only allowing so many pills.
Yes, sometimes we made a mistake. We filled it wrong, or billed it wrong, or miscounted the number of pills.
This isn't about whether we are capable of making a mistake or not. This is about how the way you approach someone determines the level of service you get.
Now some might say it shouldn't matter. The customer is always right so you should do what you can to fix the situation. Well, several years in retail have taught me that the customer is very rarely right and in fact usually has no clue what's going on. The truth also is no matter how level-headed you claim to be, when someone comes up to in a piss-poor mood, human nature kicks in.
It's hard to be nice to people who are being complete jerks to you. It's as simple as that. Sure, management tells you to just put on a happy face and trudge through it, but it's not that easy to do, especially if you have one after another that's complaining about what happened. It's even worse when it's not actually your fault.
Why am I ranting about this? I haven't had any particularly bad experiences lately, but feel the need to post this simply because I've seen a lot of people posting on my cell phone's community page complaining about the level of service they've received and how crappy they are and the phones suck. I suppose I have trouble believing it's that bad because my girlfriend and I between us have never had trouble with them and when a phone did go wonky, the situation was resolved quickly.
After reading through a bunch of the complaints and the way people described the problem they were having, I have to say I'd be pretty crabby with them too. More often than not, those trying to help the person complaining have to ask them to clarify the problem because it's so vague or poorly written. Other times, you realize it's just because they don't understand how the phone works.
More often than not, unsatisfactory customer service complaints are because the service wasn't very good. But what isn't mentioned is the attitude brought towards the person trying to help you. When I have a problem, I'm nice until given a reason otherwise (ask insurances about how I can get). If you seem to be trying to solve the problem, I'll continue to play nice. Give me unnecessary attitude and I'll get snippy back, but usually I'll just request to speak to a supervisor.
Unless you're an insurance company. I'm liable to hang up on your ass if you're not assisting me properly.
By properly, I mean blaming the software when the reality is you have no clue why I'm getting a rejection and you actually didn't go and ask anyone what it meant, you just sat and finished putting up your post on Facebook complaining about your job for the 37th time that week. If you don't know, just tell me you don't know and pass me on to someone who might know.
In terms of my cell phone company, I know I'm biased. I've been with them for over 8 years and have had virtually no problems with them. When my phone took a swim, they replaced it. When one of the next phones starting turning off repeatedly, they replaced it. When the phone after that took a couple of jumps out of my hand, they replaced it even though I was the one who damaged it. When my most recent phone went restart crazy? Yup, replaced it.
Simply put, the kind of service you get often depends on how you approach the person helping you. Granted, this isn't always true. Sometimes there are just people who hate their lives and everyone around them so they really don't care. They just want to collect their check and go without earning it. I get that, but it's not a majority of people and if you're not happy with the service, you can always move on to a supervisor.
If you go in kicking and screaming, both parties are going to end up bruised and dissatisfied. It's why when I always used to walk away when I dated a girl who's idea of being helped was to immediately give a cashier attitude if something didn't go how she wanted to go. She was the type who'd refuse to leave the line until she was "properly" helped, which meant how she wanted to be helped.
Having worked in retail for years, I'm not quite as brash. I realize that mistakes are made and sometimes cashiers are put in a tough spot. The last thing I'm going to do is yell at someone for something that probably wasn't their fault.
I also realize that sometimes people are just snakebit. You get a product, it doesn't work, you exchange it, it still doesn't work, they give you a different one, that doesn't work either. I'd get frustrated too. In that case, maybe it's time to move on and try a different line.
One complaint that stood out was the couple that was changing service providers. They were unhappy with who they had so they were switching. They had their phone numbers ported over and thought everything was good until they received a bill from their former carrier. They complained, but to no avail. The reason why they received a bill? They didn't notify their former carrier they were switching.
That's the type of thing that makes me smack my hand in my face. Do you really think any company is going to just stop billing you because you decide to walk away without saying so? Hell, some will keep billing you even if you do notify them because you didn't notify them properly. Then you'd be right to be mad. But in this case? It's on you to let them know you're canceling.
In the end, it's like anything else in life. You get out of it what you put into it. If you're bullish and mean from the start, the person on the other end of the phone is likely going to be combative. If you're friendly, they'll be more receptive to your problem.
Give it a try sometime.
Monday, October 24, 2011
confound it
I've written posts recently discussing the problem with mental health and how many get into the medical field in general with a desire to help people get better.
And in a lot of cases, we succeed. People live longer, get healthier, and appreciate what everyone does, from the nurse, to the doctor, to the pharmacy tech, to the pharmacist, to their home health aid. They make changes and do what they can to get better.
How many times have you heard about someone surviving some horrible disease and making drastic changes so that they don't experience it again, or someone who is at risk for diabetes doing what they can to reduce that risk? It happens a lot and you praise people like that who recognize what they need to do.
Then there are those who don't learn, don't make adjustments. I've seen people get put on blood pressure and cholesterol medications who refuse to make changes to their lifestyle, thinking the medications alone were going to fix them. One guy even told us once that he shouldn't have to stop eating McDonald's all day since they have medications to control his issues. When told that changing his diet would make him healthier, he scoffed at us and said he was taking his business to someone who understands his position.
It's like the people who want a pill to lose weight. Yeah, you may drop a few pounds here and there, but you're not going to lose the weight like you want to if you're still going to sit on your ass and eat ho-ho's all day and night. You have to get up and move around and adjust your diet if you really want to lose the weight. No one wants to hear that though because we've become such an overly lazy society.
Then there are people like the guy who reveals he has mouth cancer because of his chewing tobacco and goes into detail of all the things he has to endure, all the medications he's taking, and how he has to fork over a ton of money for his nausea medication from his chemotherapy.
Then he admits he still uses chewing tobacco and seems indifferent about it.
Look, if I go through something, let's say soda cancer, and the chemo fixes it and I'm cancer-free, you can bet your ass I won't be drinking any kind of pop again, and that's saying a lot because I absolutely love Pepsi. It would be hard, but if I knew that avoiding pop of any sort would help me live longer, you can bet I'm doing it.
But some people just don't care. This seems to be most true of people who use tobacco of any kind. They can't kick the habit, even if it nearly kills them. Some will quit for a brief period, but most usually start back up again.
And that's the problem with people. You can know what the problem is, know how to fix the problem, but not do the things that you need to do to get better and stay healthy because it goes against what you want to do. It's like the stories you hear in pharmacies about the people refilling medications, but not taking them because they don't think they need them.
This seems to be most common with blood pressure medications. They see their levels go down to a normal level and think everything's okay, that they can stop taking the medication. Then they go back to the doctor's because they feel sick and it's because they're off their medications.
This gets into the whole compliance thing, which is something I do not feel like talking about at this point. It's been beaten to death how difficult compliance is to enforce and it just aggravates me to talk about it.
In the end, you can't make someone stop what they're doing to make themselves ill. If you could, drug abuse wouldn't be the problem that it is. But you can't, and it is.
If someone wants to continue to put their life in harm's way, there's really nothing you can do for them.
And that's the saddest part.
And in a lot of cases, we succeed. People live longer, get healthier, and appreciate what everyone does, from the nurse, to the doctor, to the pharmacy tech, to the pharmacist, to their home health aid. They make changes and do what they can to get better.
How many times have you heard about someone surviving some horrible disease and making drastic changes so that they don't experience it again, or someone who is at risk for diabetes doing what they can to reduce that risk? It happens a lot and you praise people like that who recognize what they need to do.
Then there are those who don't learn, don't make adjustments. I've seen people get put on blood pressure and cholesterol medications who refuse to make changes to their lifestyle, thinking the medications alone were going to fix them. One guy even told us once that he shouldn't have to stop eating McDonald's all day since they have medications to control his issues. When told that changing his diet would make him healthier, he scoffed at us and said he was taking his business to someone who understands his position.
It's like the people who want a pill to lose weight. Yeah, you may drop a few pounds here and there, but you're not going to lose the weight like you want to if you're still going to sit on your ass and eat ho-ho's all day and night. You have to get up and move around and adjust your diet if you really want to lose the weight. No one wants to hear that though because we've become such an overly lazy society.
Then there are people like the guy who reveals he has mouth cancer because of his chewing tobacco and goes into detail of all the things he has to endure, all the medications he's taking, and how he has to fork over a ton of money for his nausea medication from his chemotherapy.
Then he admits he still uses chewing tobacco and seems indifferent about it.
Look, if I go through something, let's say soda cancer, and the chemo fixes it and I'm cancer-free, you can bet your ass I won't be drinking any kind of pop again, and that's saying a lot because I absolutely love Pepsi. It would be hard, but if I knew that avoiding pop of any sort would help me live longer, you can bet I'm doing it.
But some people just don't care. This seems to be most true of people who use tobacco of any kind. They can't kick the habit, even if it nearly kills them. Some will quit for a brief period, but most usually start back up again.
And that's the problem with people. You can know what the problem is, know how to fix the problem, but not do the things that you need to do to get better and stay healthy because it goes against what you want to do. It's like the stories you hear in pharmacies about the people refilling medications, but not taking them because they don't think they need them.
This seems to be most common with blood pressure medications. They see their levels go down to a normal level and think everything's okay, that they can stop taking the medication. Then they go back to the doctor's because they feel sick and it's because they're off their medications.
This gets into the whole compliance thing, which is something I do not feel like talking about at this point. It's been beaten to death how difficult compliance is to enforce and it just aggravates me to talk about it.
In the end, you can't make someone stop what they're doing to make themselves ill. If you could, drug abuse wouldn't be the problem that it is. But you can't, and it is.
If someone wants to continue to put their life in harm's way, there's really nothing you can do for them.
And that's the saddest part.
Thursday, October 20, 2011
the trouble with mental illness, part two
Not too long ago, I wrote about mental illness and why it's much more difficult to treat than other conditions we come across. I wrote about how some people respond to certain treatments better than others and how it's rare for people to find the right treatment.
My pharmacist and I had a conversation the other night that demonstrated more reasons why mental illness is so much more difficult to understand. This conversation was the end result of me discovering that I could look up people in the main software and see what was going on with them based upon nurses', doctors', and counselors' notes.
I discovered some of the more interesting clients we had were interesting for far more serious reasons than I had initially understood. The things that they had been through were far and beyond what I could've imagined, much less understood.
For example, people go through rough patches in relationships all the time, they go through custody issues all the time. Mostly it's just a simple case of two people no longer liking each other and trying to be spiteful towards one another. Well the case I was looking at was different in that the couple was engaged, but one was accused of felonious assault of a child and instead of seeing each other through the ordeal, they've been torn apart by it.
I don't want to get into too many details for a number of reasons, but this case shows how someone can appear to be better off than they actually are. I would never guess that the client was going through the things that they're dealing with.
What I learned from the discussion I had with my pharmacist though was how taboo mental illness is. You see/hear all the time with people dealing with cancer, or diabetes, or most other types of diseases how families band together, friends come to the person's side, and everyone hopes for the best. They send cards, they visit the person, they show all the support in the world.
Mental illness? They scatter. They disappear. They want NOTHING to do with the person, treating them as if they had the plague. They make fun of the person, or act like the problem can just be changed.
How many times have you seen someone tell someone suffering from depression "just don't think about it, or think happy thoughts." How many times has someone tried to make it seem like it was an easy problem to fix, that they just have to "think differently"?
The problem is, it isn't that easy. Someone who is depressed or mentally ill can't just flip a switch. Some can fight through it for the most part, but it can still catch up to them after a while.
Mental illness and treatment works the opposite of traditional diseases as well. Generally, if someone has high blood pressure, cholesterol issues, or diabetes, you can find a treatment relatively easy and implement it. In rare cases, it isn't easy and the person struggles through multiple treatments. If they fail, it's usually because they decide (rationally) they don't need the medicine.
With mental illness, it's rare that the solution is found right away. Usually several combinations of medicine and therapy are tried before the absolute right treatment is found (additionally, you generally won't need therapy for high cholesterol), and that's if it's found. Most people never find that combination and trudge through life, barely hanging on. It's sad and it's generally ignored.
One of our more troubling clients, who additionally is battling alcoholism (and losing badly), is an example of what happens to people when they start to lose control. Their own family abandoned them until recently. The client's sister hadn't seen her in years, yet had the nerve to yell at us for not doing more for the client. In my head, all I could think was "where were you for the last several years," but you can't say that. Instead, you have to bite your tongue.
That's what happens though. Family either disappears or become completely overwhelmed by having to take care of the client. Some end up devoting years upon years to take care of someone, but this is mainly because no one else wants to deal with it.
After going through some of the notes in the computer, it's become more and more clear to me that mental illness is an even bigger problem than I had already imagined, and I knew it was a big problem. These people need all the help they can get, but they don't get it.
In fact, the states are cutting funding for mental health treatment so much that people are being left behind because there aren't enough hours allowed anymore to provide people the help they need. Meanwhile, rich, healthy men and women are doing all they can to prevent tax increases on them so they can continue to live lavish lifestyles while those who need the money most continue to slip through the cracks.
Look, I'm not sitting here saying that throwing more money at the problem is going to fix it. Mental illness isn't just because someone goes through a rough patch and needs assistance. A lot of it is genetics and there isn't much you can do about that. But those that can be helped need more than they're getting.
It's a problem, but will anything happen to help change that?
My pharmacist and I had a conversation the other night that demonstrated more reasons why mental illness is so much more difficult to understand. This conversation was the end result of me discovering that I could look up people in the main software and see what was going on with them based upon nurses', doctors', and counselors' notes.
I discovered some of the more interesting clients we had were interesting for far more serious reasons than I had initially understood. The things that they had been through were far and beyond what I could've imagined, much less understood.
For example, people go through rough patches in relationships all the time, they go through custody issues all the time. Mostly it's just a simple case of two people no longer liking each other and trying to be spiteful towards one another. Well the case I was looking at was different in that the couple was engaged, but one was accused of felonious assault of a child and instead of seeing each other through the ordeal, they've been torn apart by it.
I don't want to get into too many details for a number of reasons, but this case shows how someone can appear to be better off than they actually are. I would never guess that the client was going through the things that they're dealing with.
What I learned from the discussion I had with my pharmacist though was how taboo mental illness is. You see/hear all the time with people dealing with cancer, or diabetes, or most other types of diseases how families band together, friends come to the person's side, and everyone hopes for the best. They send cards, they visit the person, they show all the support in the world.
Mental illness? They scatter. They disappear. They want NOTHING to do with the person, treating them as if they had the plague. They make fun of the person, or act like the problem can just be changed.
How many times have you seen someone tell someone suffering from depression "just don't think about it, or think happy thoughts." How many times has someone tried to make it seem like it was an easy problem to fix, that they just have to "think differently"?
The problem is, it isn't that easy. Someone who is depressed or mentally ill can't just flip a switch. Some can fight through it for the most part, but it can still catch up to them after a while.
Mental illness and treatment works the opposite of traditional diseases as well. Generally, if someone has high blood pressure, cholesterol issues, or diabetes, you can find a treatment relatively easy and implement it. In rare cases, it isn't easy and the person struggles through multiple treatments. If they fail, it's usually because they decide (rationally) they don't need the medicine.
With mental illness, it's rare that the solution is found right away. Usually several combinations of medicine and therapy are tried before the absolute right treatment is found (additionally, you generally won't need therapy for high cholesterol), and that's if it's found. Most people never find that combination and trudge through life, barely hanging on. It's sad and it's generally ignored.
One of our more troubling clients, who additionally is battling alcoholism (and losing badly), is an example of what happens to people when they start to lose control. Their own family abandoned them until recently. The client's sister hadn't seen her in years, yet had the nerve to yell at us for not doing more for the client. In my head, all I could think was "where were you for the last several years," but you can't say that. Instead, you have to bite your tongue.
That's what happens though. Family either disappears or become completely overwhelmed by having to take care of the client. Some end up devoting years upon years to take care of someone, but this is mainly because no one else wants to deal with it.
After going through some of the notes in the computer, it's become more and more clear to me that mental illness is an even bigger problem than I had already imagined, and I knew it was a big problem. These people need all the help they can get, but they don't get it.
In fact, the states are cutting funding for mental health treatment so much that people are being left behind because there aren't enough hours allowed anymore to provide people the help they need. Meanwhile, rich, healthy men and women are doing all they can to prevent tax increases on them so they can continue to live lavish lifestyles while those who need the money most continue to slip through the cracks.
Look, I'm not sitting here saying that throwing more money at the problem is going to fix it. Mental illness isn't just because someone goes through a rough patch and needs assistance. A lot of it is genetics and there isn't much you can do about that. But those that can be helped need more than they're getting.
It's a problem, but will anything happen to help change that?
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