Urgent help: Can’t get hold of essential medication and it runs out today. What should I do?

[Nifedipine]

Hello!
I would appreciate if someone could help, I am at a total loss and don’t know how to move forward. My wife gave birth recently and due to a post-birth complication had to stay in hospital for 10 days. She is now on medication, she was discharged with 5 days’ worth of tablets and told to ask GP to prescribe more. This was done, but in a series of unfortunate events somehow we still can’t get hold of the medication which runs out today. I don’t know where we have gone wrong in navigating the systems, so I will list below what we have done in the hope someone can tell me where we may have gone wrong and what to do in order to set things right and get to the medication as this is now super urgent:

Day 1: Hospital discharge, midwife said she would send medication list to GP later that day (and she duly did so)
Day 2: We requested the prescription from the GP through their online system.
Day 3: Prescription done by GP and sent to local pharmacy. I phoned the pharmacy and they said to go and collect the next day.
Day 4: Gone to collect medication just to be told that there is a manufacturing issue with the medication (Nifedipine) and that they could not get it for me and I should phone other pharmacies to check. I managed to find one that had it, drove there just to be told that they have the 20mg version while the prescription said 40mg. I showed them the box of the current one, which is also 20mg and my wife is taking 2 tablets at a time but they said they could not dispense a different strength one. They told me to call GP next day (as this was on Sunday) and get a new prescription.
Day 5 (today): Phoned GP surgery in the morning, they have modified the prescription and sent it to the pharmacy that has the stock. I phoned pharmacy to check and they don’t have the prescription. I phoned GP surgery again, they have put me on call back list, that was an hour ago and nothing yet.

I am really worried that we will not get hold of the medication on time as it is now the afternoon and I don’t seem to be able to get through to the GP. I also spoke to the hospital pharmacy as they were the ones dispensing the original pack but they outright refused as they said they don’t deal with GP prescriptions.

Has anyone got an idea of how to move forward with this?
Thank you very much in advance!

If you are in England could you sign up for the prescription service which gets delivered to your home?

I am sorry I don’t know the details as I live in Wales where this is not available but it sounds like a possible solution for you.

You can set yourself up for repeat prescription.. The pharmacy will then reorder in for you before time.

They may not do this though asmay need a GP appointment prior as blood pressure may come down again so can start to wean off.
My blood pressure took 6-9 months after first and never back to normal after 2nd.

Congratulations on baby and I wish you luck

@Nifedipine it isn't possible for a prescription not to be sent to a nominated pharmacy initially so you would have to name one but the gp only has to press a button to change it each time.
It literally takes 2 minutes for a pharmacy to release something back into the spine so i m sorry that the wrong pharmacy messed you about so much as it really doesn't take that much of their time to give the correct pharmacy the barcode.

I would ring the pharmacy you want to use a good 4 or 5 days before your wife runs out so they can tell you if there is still an issue before you order the prescription and then if they say they have an issue it means you can try calling elsewhere as pharmacies don't have records of their stock that you can access all you can do is call them directly. I'd try an independent pharmacy over boots as they won't be tied in a contract with one supplier so you'll have a better chance.

(I used to be a pharmacy technician and had to take nifedipine myself for two months postpartum, depending on what the issue she has i would make sure to do bp reading before ordering the next month though. As it is possible outside of the stress of the hospital and after some recovery time that it could get better gradually so she might be able to have a lower dose next time )

that should say boots or big chains

PHone your local pharmacy and explain the problem; they deal with people running out of medication all the time and will give you an emergency supply.

Just to add, it is definitely possible (if you are in England) to hav the prescription sent to thw spine rather than one pharmacy. Then ask your surgery for the barcode or EPS code. Take this code to the pharmacy that has your item in stock and they will be able to down load the prescription from the spine and dispense the medication.

I would avoid signing up with a postal delivery service especially where there are supply issues with a certain medication.

I work as a prescription clerk in a GP surgery so I deal with these kind of issues a lot.
Pleased it was sorted today for you op.

Thank you everyone for all the advice, this has been hugely helpful and hopefully we have a less difficult time next time.

TheSparkling This is so useful to know, thank you! We will ask for the next prescription to not be sent to a particular pharmacy to avoid unnecessary delay.

Nifed I have regular problems with prescriptions, and lack of supply etc. I now have an arrangement with the surgery where they deliver a physical copy of the prescription to the pharmacy over the road (otherwise if it goes electronically it charges me twice for the same prescription). This seems to be working at the moment. When I am due for a new prescription, I have a saved letter on my laptop, explaining the unusual arrangement, and thanking them profusely. I just put my old prescription in the box, with semi-grovelly letter, as I can't get near the desk with covid restrictions. Is it possible to negotiate a couple of months tablets at a time? I did this, and it saves me the hassle of doing it every month.

Thank you, SpongeBob. I'll see if this can be done here too, the GP practice has a pharmacy attached to it, although sadly they didn't have stock either. We asked for 2 months' supply as the pharmacy was encouraging this as their stock may run out by next month but GP only prescribed 1 month's worth. This may also be due to the fact this is post partum medication and I guess will be reviewed regularly in terms of how long a treatment is needed.

I'm sorry, but any pharmacy worker worth their salt will be able to deal with out of stock medication fairly swiftly. It can just involve seeing what straight alternative is in stock, contacting the GP surgery and asking for a replacement script. Or if there is no straight alternative they will again have to contact the GP and ask for a prescription for a different but similar drug. It shouldn't take more than a few hours to fix, depending on how quick the GP surgery are to send new prescriptions.

britnay: I must admit I am a complete stranger to NHS systems, so wasn't really challenging the steps along the way but also felt like I was completely left to my own devices and the professionals did not try to facilitate things. At the end of the day everyone seemed to just be a victim of a dysfunctional system, but it was so stressful to think that this was going to lead to health risks for my wife. She really could have done without the anxiety of all this! Also, would a single mother in this situation just have to drag herself through all this madness with baby in tow? I still can't get my head around that this is the normal state of affairs in healthcare.