I'm lucky that our pharmacy is in the village, literary up the road from me. The staff are wonderful, they have given me much needed advice in the past (thus providing me with ammunition when discussing a matter with a GP), send for emergency medication if necessary and have rung me personally to check if I am ok and my meds are not causing me any issues. Worth their weight in gold, they are.
I have no problem with the pharmacy I use, it's the system at the GP surgery for issuing repeat prescriptions which isn't fit for purpose. In the past few years they have gone from on-line requests being actioned within 24 hours to 10 days (if you're lucky).
When I had my last prescription change for my BP tablets the pharmacist did ask if I would like a call after a couple of weeks to check that everything was OK. I declined as there was already an appointment set up with the pharmacist at the surgery to do that.Â
I honestly can't remember the last time I actually had a face to face consultation with a doctor at our surgery.
I agree Debs, but it's never acceptable to scream at someone in their seventies (or any age) on front of assistants and customers. When I was nursing, you've had a row with the old man, kids are sick, parent dying,you plaster on the 'workface" and be a professional.
Our pharmacy will deliver, free, Â but as Rowland says, Â I will collect while I can and let someone who needs the service have it. My pills are put in a dispensing machine, Â they send a text with a code, I can go anytime to collect. Â It was especially useful during covid as I could collect late at night when no one was about. Flu injections there as well and they do all the childrenâs injection, Â so no, Â The more I think about it, Â I really don't want it to go. Our Surgery seems to be ok, Â the only thing I use them for is covid jabs, Â Iâve not seen a doctor for 23 years.Â
Gardening on the wild, windy west side of Dartmoor.Â
Many prescription items are unavailable at the moment donât get me started on HRT and thatâs not the fault of the pharmacy staff.Â
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I use my local pharmacy for prescriptions but it's an effort to grit my teeth, hide my curmudgeonliness and remain polite when every single time the staff on the counter try to charge me double for my HRT, and when I point out that it's a combined one (both drugs in one pill) so it's one prescription charge, they question me as if they think I'm trying to fiddle the system and then I have to wait for them to go into the back and check with the pharmacist. And when I phone before going in to make sure they've got the full prescription (because I know it's usually not in stock and has to be ordered), they tell me they have but when I go in to collect it invariably they've only got one packet so I wonder if the person answering the phone doesn't actually bother checking.
 I'm tempted by online pharmacies but for now I'm persevering with the local one. It's part of a big chain so there's possibly a systemic issue with training or can't-be-bothered culture.
Doncaster, South Yorkshire. Soil type: sandy, well-drained
Our pharmacy is very good, and they work closely with the surgery ... so no complaints from me.Â
Funny story when I was in there yesterday. A man was speaking German to the sales assistant, who couldn't make out what he was saying. He'd clearly been there a while as both of them were getting a bit frustrated. I don't speak German but I can speak French, and asked him if he could. So we managed to establish he'd been seasick coming across on the ferry and wanted something to take to help with the return journey.
Sales assistant said that he was the third person asking for seasickness pills that morning, but the others had spoken English so she hadn't put 2 and 2 together. Must have been a helluva crossing.
Bee x
Gardener and beekeeper in beautiful Scottish Borders Â
A single bee creates just one twelfth of a teaspoon of honey in her lifetime
@JennyJ, in fairness to the person you spoke to on the phone, they may have checked stock levels on the computer but wouldn't necessarily know how many other requests were waiting to be filled for the same medication.
Fair enough @KT53 , but on every occasion they've said the full prescription was made up and ready to collect. I suspect they don't actually check that it's all there but just that there's something, so I have to go again a few days later for the rest when I'd have been happy to leave it a few days and just go once if they gave me the correct information. I always request the prescription a few weeks ahead of when I'll run out, on the advice of the nurse practitioner who prescribes it.
Doncaster, South Yorkshire. Soil type: sandy, well-drained
Use them or lose them. I am sure delivery by post is great, until you need something immediately, but by then, if you havenât been using them, your pharmacy might have shut. I would also add, that a good pharmacist can be a very useful source of advice. When people ask me medical stuff, I often recommend talking to the pharmacist.
How can you lie there and think of England When you don't even know who's in the team
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My pills are put in a dispensing machine, Â they send a text with a code, I can go anytime to collect. Â It was especially useful during covid as I could collect late at night when no one was about.
Flu injections there as well and they do all the childrenâs injection, Â so no, Â The more I think about it, Â I really don't want it to go.
Our Surgery seems to be ok, Â the only thing I use them for is covid jabs, Â Iâve not seen a doctor for 23 years.Â
Funny story when I was in there yesterday.
A man was speaking German to the sales assistant, who couldn't make out what he was saying. He'd clearly been there a while as both of them were getting a bit frustrated.
I don't speak German but I can speak French, and asked him if he could.Â
So we managed to establish he'd been seasick coming across on the ferry and wanted something to take to help with the return journey.
Sales assistant said that he was the third person asking for seasickness pills that morning, but the others had spoken English so she hadn't put 2 and 2 together.
Must have been a helluva crossing.
Bee x
A single bee creates just one twelfth of a teaspoon of honey in her lifetime
I am sure delivery by post is great, until you need something immediately, but by then, if you havenât been using them, your pharmacy might have shut.
I would also add, that a good pharmacist can be a very useful source of advice. When people ask me medical stuff, I often recommend talking to the pharmacist.
When you don't even know who's in the team
S.Yorkshire/Derbyshire border