Tuesday 6 February 2018

What a palaver!

Life when you have a chronic illness life rarely runs smooth. 

This weeks palaver is with my pharmacy. I get my medication delivered on a Friday to start taking them on a Monday morning and I have them sorted into a tray which makes things easier for my memory and medication compliance. (Now I'm wishing that I'd checked my tray on Friday) because on Monday morning I found that instead of 2 Gabapentin tablets 3 times a day I'd been given 1 tablet instead. Grrr! I checked my online prescription and yes it stated 'Gabapentin 2tds*' so I called the pharmacy and explained the issue so they sent the delivery driver to come and collect my tray for amending. At around 4.30pm the pharmacy's delivery driver retured with my medication tray; opening it only to find that no changes to my tray had actually been made! Queue another phone call to the pharmacy who told me it was all in order and the prescription they received from the Drs surgery last week stated 1 Gabapentin tablet 3 times a day. Queue second phone call to the Drs surgery who confirmed that I should have 2 Gabapentin tablets so they sent over another amended prescription electronically to the pharmacy. Then I made the third phone call back to the pharmacy to state that a prescription was being electorally sent over to them with the correct dosage on.


*tds means three times daily

So today (Tuesday) I called the pharmacy to see if they recieved the prescription and to arrange for the medication tray to be picked up for the second time round. Pharmacy stated that no electronic prescription hasn't been received! So I called the Drs surgery again to check that the prescription has been sent, to which it has and the receptionist gave me the barcode for the prescription.

I was supposed to be going out to see a friend who I haven't seen in a while today but instead I'm eating around for the delivery driver to collect my medication tray! (Annoyed doesn't cover it.)

So when the delivery driver arrives I have the barcode for the electronic prescription to give to him to pass onto the pharmacy (but hopefully they will have it by now).

I switched to this pharmacy as my previous pharmacy was a bit of a nightmare when it came to my controlled drugs, but apart from the odd hiccup this pharmacy has been relatively okay.

Hopefully the pharmacy driver won't be too long now to come and collect my tray and they pharmacy are able to amend my Gabapentin tablets so I can get off to my friend's house.

I'm writing this post as I wanted to share that life with chronic illness rarely runs smoothly, and all sorts of things can get in the way of our lives whether it be pharmacy errors, symptoms, equipment going wrong etc. 

Despite the problems I'm having I'm am feeling gratitude for:

  • Pharmacy home delivery service
  • That I have at least some Gabapentin to keep my symptoms at an okay level
  • Having a day off from the TC and hopefully getting to see my friend at some point
*** UPDATE ***

Step-mum came home to take over the 'waiting for the pharmacy shift' so I was able to got out for coffee with my friend.

Pharmacy never turned up (well, they claimed they did but someone was in the house the whole time and we never noticed them). Pharmacy said to borrow tablets from other compartments in my tray so I get my proper dose and need to drop my tray in tomorrow morning when I'm out with my carer so it can be amended then.