Misc Me Vs. The Pharmacist

[belperboy]

Hi there

Just want to get a general consensus on this and an idea of how to proceed. I am prescribed ambien 10mg per day for insomnia. It hadn't been working too well recently so I had talk with my Dr about increasing it to 20mg but I didn't know what the cost would be as I don't have insurance. He said to check into it and if it was affordable to try the 20mg and if it worked better then he would write me a new script for it. Well, I tried it for a week and it helped a lot and I found that the extra 30 pills only cost another couple of dollars even with no insurance. He called me a new script in as soon as I called to let him know. I already had one 10mg script at my pharmacy with 2 refills on it that I got filled about two weeks ago which he knew (he wrote it).
The last one I got filled was a weird generic that for some reason gave me migraines in the morning when I woke up although the insomnia was much better. I asked the pharmacist if with the new script I could get a different generic, they said it would take a few days to ordered it so I decided to have it transferred because I didn't want to deal with the migraines. Well the place I got it transferred to s refusing to fill it because I just got the 10mg script filled two weeks ago. I explained the situation and they just treated me like some drug seeker and told me they wouldn't fill it.
Do I have any recourse here? I know it's a controlled substance (barely) but it's a legitimate script and my doc already knew I had the scripts for the 10mgs he wrote.
Thanks in advance for any input.

 

[tentram]

its ultimately up to the pharmacists discretion, so all you can do is try another or wait for the generics to come in.

im in australia and things work a little different. thursday i filled an oxy script. same day my drs office rang to tell me i had another to pick up. upon filling this one out the pharmacist, covering her ass had to verify it with my doc as well as the drugs of dependency unit. im not a dr shopper so it was fine.

youll find each pharmacy use their individual discrepency.

 

[Artificial Emotion]

I can understand why they would be suspicious. Generics are meant to be no different than patented brand names so when you come in and claim that one generic causes migraines it's understandable that they might suspect you might find one more abusable than the other. I believe you but I'm just coming from their point of view.

On the other hand I can sympathise. I use 10ml needle-less syringes for measuring out organic fertiliser volumes and last week was refused service because they thought I was using it for drugs. They humiliated me in front of about ten other customers just because I asked for a cough medicine syringe. It's totally their prerogative though, shitty as it is.

 

[belperboy]

Thanks for the reply.
That's sort of what I was thinking. It just makes me mad as there's no legal reason for not filling it, or insurance reason as I have none, it's a cash pay. It's barely even a controlled substance. We're just subject to whatever the pharmacist's discretion might be. It seems most in the USA automatically think anyone getting a controlled substance filled should automatically be under suspicion. It's not their job to 'protect' me or prevent me from anything. If anything that's the Dr's job and he wrote the damn script in full knowledge of all the details. Seems most are on some kind of power trip. And I totally understand the whole embarrassing thing. I'm sure it doesn't go for all pharmacists but it's almost as though they take pleasure in it in especially when there's a line of customers behind you. I've been on percocet before for sciatica and it was exactly the same treatment then. At least that was slightly more understandable due to the major abuse of it and it being a schedule II But ambien, come on...what do they think I'm going to do? Take three or four of them and wander around at night, piss myself and wake up in a dumpster with no clue of what happened? I know there are reactions like that to the medication but I've been on it for a couple of months and never had that issue. It just helps me sleep, which anyone with severe insomnia can tell you is torture sometimes.

 

[Mr.Scagnattie]

Have your doctor call the pharmacy and explain that it's okay. That usually does the trick.

 

[tentram]

people do a lot of degrading shit on hypnotics. id say they had your best interests at heart

 

[teological]

I just came in here to also support your contention that indeed generics do seem to be "different". My uncle, who lives with us at times, had come into town and had his 2mg Xanax script filled, he usually gets the actual brand name "Xanax", but was offered a generic 2mg version of alprazolam. Anyway, long story short, he takes it before bed; he firstly found it hard to get to sleep, then once he did he woke up throughout the night with headaches and feeling moderately sick. His eyes and head were his main issues.

The very next day. we went out to one of our family doctors who knows him very well, and he got a script for another bottle and bought the brand name...then took it at night and all returned to normal...lol, I too have had this complaint with generic vs brand name Codeine, on a personal level.

No one in the pharmacist fields takes this as truth I know, heck I can not understand it either, but it does seem that generic medicine has "something" missing.

 

[Morphling]

Inactive ingredients have a long history of causing bad reactions to medication. These pharmacists are full of derp.

 

[tentram]

scag - normally its the pharmacist left to call the dr, as shared in my anecdote.

the dr has written the script and is fine by them. these bean counters just like to get on their high horse.

in my situation it was totally acceptable as id jurt filled the same script hours before. if i were to have said no to her calling itd be suspicious and im not roarting the system. she went so far as to apologise for the inconvenience. pretty little asian woman loves me with the rest of them in there.

 

[missmeyet?]

I can understand why they would be suspicious. Generics are meant to be no different than patented brand names so when you come in and claim that one generic causes migraines it's understandable that they might suspect you might find one more abusable than the other. I believe you but I'm just coming from their point of view.

On the other hand I can sympathise. I use 10ml needle-less syringes for measuring out organic fertiliser volumes and last week was refused service because they thought I was using it for drugs. They humiliated me in front of about ten other customers just because I asked for a cough medicine syringe. It's totally their prerogative though, shitty as it is.

Actually this is not true (sorry). Though the generics are supposed to have (within a certain amount) the same active ingredient, they all have different inactive ingredients and fillers. It is somewhat common for someone to be allergic or not do well with the inactive ingredients in one or another and therefore request a different one. This is also one of the few reason why an insurance will approve to pay for a brand name drug when there is a generic available when they otherwise would not pay for the more expensive one. So this is definately a legit reason to ask for a different manufacturer.

OP, if you cannot get them to transfer it somewhere else that will fill it then let your doc know what the deal is and he may be ok with just writing you another script. Take it somewhere else and ask them what brand they have in stock and tell them that there is one that is not acceptable before you hand them the script. I would also explain the situation to them before I hand it over. It is their discretion not to fill it but I would let the management know I am unhappy and will no longer be using their services!

 

[belperboy]

Thanks for all the replies. Finally after arguing with them they conceded and I got the script. I think part of the issue was that I had it transferred from the usual place I go to because of, like I said, the migraines and kmart had a different generic (which works fine btw). Anyway, Kmart has a special here where if you transfer a prescription you get a $25 gift card. As stupid as it seems (because the store was advertising the shit out of the offer) the pharmacists were giving me as hard a time about whether I qualified for it or not. Now, I wouldn't turn a free $25 down but if it was that or getting the meds I needed, well it's the meds every time. I thought a call to my Dr would fix things but they only have an answering service where you have to leave a message for the nurse before 12pm each day. After leaving several and Kmart telling me they heard nothing I figured either Kmart was further f-ing me over or the nurse didn't feel it important enough. Anyway, long story short; it's true Kmart sucks! I won't be going there again. Thanks again to you all for the info and the support!