[legzzalot]

Last time I had ambien filled, i had a 30 day supply, one a day and I ran out on day 27?

In line to fill a prescription today and the lady in front of me was there because she was missing pills (pain pills). Today I filled the big bottle of percocet for my back, by big I mean 45 pills.

Just went to put the leftover from bottle one into bottle two, and thought "I better count these". I counted them. Only 40 in the bottle. So I count again. 40 again. I call the pharmacy.

After being on hold for 10 minutes and speaking with two pharmacy techs, the second one asks me if anyone initialed the bottle. I said yes. his response: "well, ma'am that means it was counted twice and there were 45 pills in the bottle when we gave it to you." OK, so someone cannot count to 45 the first or second time, I guess because there are only 40 pills in the bottle!

So he puts me through to the head guy who tells me he will check their on hand stock and call me right back. 10 minutes later I get a call back from "mr. they were counted twice". Seems the 5 missing pills miraculously showed up in the inventory and I am correct. He apologizes profusely, I tell him it is not a big deal and I will pick them up tomorrow.

I do not think I will be using Walgreen's anymore for my prescriptions. Which is a shame because all of their other stuff in the store is pretty cheap and they have some cool stuff, I like shopping there.

I had another issue when I first started using them with having an incorrect amount of pills, but that was easy to explain, it was a refill on a pill that I had to gradually get used to (1 a day for x days, then 2 a day, then 3) they refilled it with those same instructions instead of the full 3 a day.

I kind of have a 3 strikes and you are out rule, especially when it comes to medication. If they cannot count the correct number of pills, how do I know they are even giving me the correct pills to begin with?

[Erin524]

You could always ask them to count them again in front of you. (not sure if they'll do it, but might not hurt to ask)

I learned years ago that if you're getting a controlled substance from any pharmacy, to try to count them as soon as you can to make sure you've got them all.

[Riverwild]

I've gotten the wrong medication. incorrect amount of medication, picked up the remainder of a medication that was not available in stock and had the full bottle waiting when they only owed me 40 pills on a 540 refill, etc.

Pharmacists and pharm techs are human and they make mistakes. If you have an ongoing relationship with the pharmacy they will almost always make it right, they do for me. Every time I have had a problem they have corrected it and given me a gift card for my trouble to make up for my time spent on it.

I picked up a scrip the other day and there was a 25.00 gift card attached because back in January, I saved their butts when they dispensed a drug that was incorrect and I caught it when I was setting up the man's weekly meds. They even offered to come to my house to pick up the bottle and deliver the correct med! I can tell you that was something I have NEVER heard of before. I live 25 miles from the pharmacy in a very rural area. The pharmacist was waiting for me the next morning when I came in at 7:00 a.m, and they don't open until 8:00!

All that being said......I count the meds when I get home. We usually do a monthly pickup and there's too many bottles and too many pills to do it at the pharmacy. I set up the meds a month at a time, so it's easy to see if there's anything missing.

[braingonebad]

I think there can be mistakes. But when it involves repeats of controlled drugs, that's a red flag to me.

Your doctor is going to look at you funny if you need refills too soon, whether someone else is at fault or not.

One time, I went to pick up one med and they had two ready for me. No doc was supposed to call that in, because I had refills on mine already. I asked the pharm to look at the computer to see where the call had come from, (could not have been dropped off, I had the old bottle) - there was nothing, no info.



I was short pills another time. After that, I'd take my stuff right over to another counter, and count em myself before I even left. I think that freaked them a little, too bad!

I caught another shortage - after a lotta hoopla, they had to call in an auditor.

It was odd because for years nobody had had any trouble at this store.

Well after the audit, somebody wasn't working there anymore, and the pills were right on again.

[Dejibo]

My mother has recieved prilosec in stead of prozac. They apologized, but she was in agony with a tummy ache for two weeks before we figured it out.

I take morpheine, and that means I personally stand there, pop off the tops and COUNT right there! normally once you walk away from the counter side, you lose the right to complain. A DC with a circle around it means, someone double counted them, but if two idiots are in cahoots, you LOSE! Speak to the pharmacist in charge (its HIS license at risk) tell him you have seen this pattern emerging, and let him know that YOU will be doing the final count BEFORE leaving, and to mark your card as "Im watching!" This normally scares the pill thieif off of your account.

Im sorry that happened. Please keep an eye on it.

[KAOheim]

That's why I use a local pharmacy and know the folks by name, specially the owner. I pay a little more than I would using express scrips (delivery) but I can go back and they don't question me because they know I'm not involved in any funny business. I'm a person to them not an account.

I got half my scrip for percocets and the rest was filled after a phone call with no problem.

[Abbie]

Last year... my brother was given a prescription for an ANTIBIOTIC... and the script was filled with an ANTI-PSYCHOTIC!!!

He didn't know that he had ben given the wrong medicine until he became VERY ILL.... he took the pills with him back to the doc... the doc noticed the pills were not the antibiotic that he prescribed.

My brother was in the hospital for a couple of weeks.

I have an family friend that counts all of her meds right there at the pharmacy... she has caught numerous errors.


Abbie

[Erin524]

One of my former bosses...a guy that I'd worked for for seven years was accidentally killed by a pharmacy mix-up.

He and his son had similar names. He had "III" at the end of his name, and his son had "IV" on the end of his...so that was the only difference in their names.

The pharmacy filled Rx's for both of them that day. I dont know what medications they were getting, but the son's medication was put into the wrong bottle. I dont know if he had an allergic reaction to it, or if the medication he'd gotten caused him problems with a pre-exisiting health problem...I just know that it killed him later that night.

That was probably the only boss I ever had that I really enjoyed working for. So, I'm really sad that he's gone now. I'm sad for his wife and kids too. I worked with all of them. They were all so nice. My boss died, and they had their lives ruined because some pharmacy tech got confused.

I know his wife sued the pharmacy and won. I know she'd have rathered have her husband back.

[soxmom]

I once was away at my inlaws. Before we left I filled my script for tramadol.
I took two at about 11 am. Unfortunately they had filled it with trazadone.

I passed out and slept until 4pm...when I got up I went to the pharmacy
to find out about the mix up. I thought I was dying....grrrr how
embarrassing! Yup...thats my dil the ol junkie sleepin it off!

[Jules A]

These kind of things always make me sad and as a nurse I can attest to the fact that every one can make mistakes so it is important to double check and question anything that seems off.

FWIW at all the facilities I have worked Ambien is a controlled substance as Brain mentioned and requires extra counts as precautions. Whether or not you decide to change pharmacies I'd consider notifiying someone higher up at Walgreens because this sounds fishy to me.