Steve,
I just read your webpage concerning the interaction and legalities between pharmacists, physicians and patients.
Briefly, this is what happened to me. I’d like to know if I can file a civil lawsuit against this pharmacist.
For the last 6-years I have been on prescription pain medications. I’ve had 12 spine surgeries, and as such my entire lumbar spine is fused as is my entire cervical spine. Both are fused with “ladders and girders” with posterior and anterior entries. I’ve also had a lateral entry to fuse T12 to L5. Al the rest are fused, and I have chronic pain as a result.
My Primary Care physician has monitored my surgeries, and has prescribed 120 mg of morphine and 120 mg of oxycodone to treat my pain. As such, my pain is a 0 or 1 throughout the day and night. Without it, my pain is easily a 4, and it can spike up to a 6-7 if I am active, or turn the wrong way with a fused spine.
I’ve used a Walgreens pharmacy for 5 of those 6 years. The Pharmacy Manager, “Dan,” has always monitored me closely, and has looked at me with a cocked eye. In short, he is routinely looking for some reason to deny me those medications. I am a Ph.D. Medical researcher. I travel frequently. As such, I sometimes need to fill the script early. Other times I am late in picking up my meds. Whether I am early or late, Dan is always grilling me with pill count questions, as well as questioning my reasons for being early. When I travel, I often have to refill a few days early. Sometimes, I’m late getting back from out of state, and I don’t pick up the medications until I’m obviously back in town. How I manage that medication (early or late) is between myself and my physician. I see him in office every time these meds are refilled. He asks me to provide proof of a flights or reasons for having to refill early. He is my physician, and he monitors my refill schedule and the reason for that early or late refill requirement.
I provide “Dan” photo copies of my plane tickets when I refill early. And my last refill was 06 June 2017. When that refill occurred, the pharmacist who refilled it, had a conversation with my physician. The physician was angry, accused the pharmacist of playing doctor, and produced other extenuating and mitigating issues—bottom line, he made it clear that he would not tolerate a pharmacist playing doctor and directing me to withdrawal. The pharmacist agreed to refill the meds on the phone. However, when I walked up to the pharmacy counter, the pharmacist present, said she would refill the morphine, and oxycodone this time, that she would refill the morphine on 6 JUL, but stated, she would not refill the oxycodone until 13 JUL 2017. This meant I would not have full medications on the 06 JUL refill date, instead, I would be forced to wait until 13 JUL to refill my oxycodone.
As such I was forced to managed my medications with what I had available. Since the female pharmacist told me she would not refill my oxycodone until 13 JUL; this meant I could not take the medication as prescribed. In other words, she and Dan did not care about the 06 JUL date—they were going mandate that I not refill until 13 JUL.
I understood I would have to miss doses and stretch the medications out until after 13 JUL for refill. This is why I did not visit my physician until the 19th of JUL, and then try to have the pharmacy refill on the 20th.
On 20n JUL, “Dan” refused to refill the medications. Further, he grilled me on pill counts, asked horribly personal questions and made absolutely inappropriate allegations that I had been deceptive with him, that I had lied to him, and more. He wanted to know if I’d gone into withdrawals. He wanted to know if my physician knew I was in withdrawal. He then started telling me (with the entire staff listening) that I lied about plane flights, and that I did not take my medications as prescribed. My efforts to tell him that it was his staff who pushed my refill date out of range for me. I also asked him if he was calling the airlines to see if I canceled my flights or not. He admitted he had done this. I told him he had greatly exceeded his scope of practice; that he was not a private investigator, and I doubted Walgreens would stand behind him on that kind of conduct. He continued speaking disrespectfully of me, and of my doctor, and said, “you are not answering my questions to my satisfaction, perhaps that “hot shot doctor” you have can do it, but I’ve been on hold with his office for 20 minutes.…etc., etc..
Angry, I snatched my scripts back and walked out.
I want to sue him civilly, for his calling the airlines to check on my flights, for calling me a liar, for telling me in front of everyone that I was deceptive. I want to wipe that smart ass smirk off his face. My physician, is going to call him and let him have a piece of his mind as well, but I want to take it further. I feel he violated my civil rights, among other things. To be clear, I did cancel my flight one time—why? Because I thought I was having a heart attack. The flight attendant called paramedics and I was escorted off the plane and taken to the closest emergency room. I was admitted into the hospital where I stayed for the next five days undergoing cardiac work ups.
What do you think? What can I do to remedy this?
I have migrated my entire prescription file (15 scripts + 2-pain meds) to another pharmacy that was ecstatic. The other 15 meds are cardiac and hormonal meds.
I would appreciate any feedback you might provide.
Thank you.
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