What the hell is going on with pharmacies

[thinkponk48]

There are three pharmacies in my town. All three have restricted opening hours. I stood in line for 25 min a few days ago to get a prescription filled. I was told it had to be ordered and pick it up today. Got there Today and pharmacy closed!!!!

Are companies not paying properly or are we suddenly short of pharmacists

Im not even talking about not being able to get certain drugs I understand supply chain issues but I don't understand the staffing issues. Surely this is big chains cutting costs

The poor service is why they make large profits.

No shit Sherlock.

Our Well pharmacy is pretty good but only opens 9 til 5 Monday to Friday. The Boots pharmacy is awful although opens Saturday morning. They still only allow two people in at any one time and the queues outside are long so dropping off a prescription involes queueing twice as they won't allow you to wait whilst they dispense. Nothing much on the shelves but no longer allowed to browse anyway because of the queue outside.

Yes noticed this.

I consider myself very lucky to have the pharmacy within my doctors surgery

There are also 2 independent ones near where i work which i've used in the past

The Covid excuse is well past it's use by date isn't it .

Still the Post Office near work is using it for their pathetic opening hours of 10am till 4pm with an hour for lunch weekdays only

Short of staff and short of medication

They are in a funding crisis and have been for some years:
community pharmacy bodies urge prime minister to resolve sectors fund crisis

Its unbelievably hard to get onto a pharmacist course at uni - if you are getting those grades at school then financially you’d be better off in medicine, dental or law. They are not paid enough.

Pay for Pharmacy technicians and dispensers is very poor.

Same here.

Honestly I want to vote with my feet but I don't have a choice about who to use. It's infuriating.

Today when it wasn't open they wouldn't even send a manager down to apologise to people. They made a security guard and someone from a make up counter tell people as they came in.

One of us has regular meds needed and we have had real issues with the local pharmacy opening hours (we moved a few months ago and really miss our previous excellent one, now hundreds of miles away. We've actually changed to an online service as opening hours where we are now are generally so very limited).

Doesn't help you now though, does 111 or your local NHS CCG (or Integrated Care Board as I think they're currently called this week) or your local newspaper site have a list of 24 hour or late pharmacies near you?

Hope you get it resolved soon.

I know a pharmacist who's a millionaire, due to consultancy work. Nearly 20 years ago he said the average pharmacist in general practice only gets about £35,000/year and has an overdraft of the same amount. Nearly 70 years ago my grandfather had the same problem.
The biggest problem is that the dispensing fee paid by the nhs has to be subsidised by the pharmacy as it nowhere covers the costs.

There probably isn't a manager on site.

My husband switched to Pharmacy2u- he really recommends it. Tablets kept coming, even during pandemic.

Our local pharmacy has a week turnaround for prescriptions.

No problems with opening hours here but there has been a shortage of medication - i had to go to 3 different pharmacies to get thr penicillin I'd been prescribed and couldn't get a hold of chloramphenicol drops for love nor money. The 4th pharmacy I went to I managed to get the ointment.

You can't see a pharmacist as when you ask to see one, you get one of those counter assistant 'healthcare advisors' who think they are doctors, despite being advised by the NHS that you can utilise the services of another healthcare professional ie pharmacist instead of using up a GP appointment if it's appropriate. I now only go to the small pharmacies as they seem to be more willing in allowing you to speak to a pharmacist.

Outrageous, who wants to take on that level of responsibility for no doubt the same level of pay as being in charge of just the one branch.

HCPs are being run into the ground, I see it daily as a nurse. There isn't long left of HCPs good will.

So in terms of staffing levels, are we looking at a situation where seven figure salary people decide it's not profitable to increase staffing because their salary would be reduced?

I realise the NHS supply cost is a separate issue.

Outrageous, who wants to take on that level of responsibility for no doubt the same level of pay as being in charge of just the one branch

Nobody does, it will be the final nail in the coffin if they manage to get it through.

It's a very unappealing job right now, hence the staff shortages.

From a personal perspective being a community pharmacist is very inflexible if you have a family, I changed sector for that reason, much better work life balance. Many others are doing the same.

COVID is still blamed for a lot of things, but medication supply issues and price rises are due to Brexit

I still can't find the useful article someone posted but this also talks about the sort of issues affecting supply

edition.cnn.com/2022/12/12/health/drug-shortages-explainer/index.html

Tbh I think the NHS is significantly to blame for this. I have a regular prescription for thyroid that doesn't change from month to month - with only an annual blood test to check it.

They insist on dispensing monthly which means 12 prescriptions and 12 admin costs. There is no reason why I couldn't be issues with 6 months at a time. It's just massive NHS inefficiencies. It's the same for another prescription I have and also for my DH who has several regular prescriptions and ditto my DD. What a waste of time resources and money. It wastes pharmacy time and GP time to authorise the prescription 12 times a year pointlessly.

This must be happening to probably 50% of the population. We would need way fewer pharmacists and GPs if this system worked efficiently.

You do realise some of those healthcare advisors are very qualified in advising you and if they feel the need, they will refer to the pharmacist! Going to a pharmacy does not necessarily mean you need to speak to a pharmacist and if said pharmacist is checking a very complex dossett box with 20+ meds in, do you really think they can just stop?

Anyway pharmacy is currently a thankless job, I’m working nearly 60 hours a week and still get yelled at because they have to wait 15 minutes for a green they’ve just walked in with, apparently it being only one item means it should only take two minutes.

Sick to death of the attitude we get right now, we can be slower and safe or rush and give you the wrong medication… Which would you prefer and don’t even get me started on the ethical question of dispensing an item that we lose money on because we won’t get paid the actual cost versus ensuring someone gets their medication promptly and not having to wait until the generic version is back in stock.

I used to work as a pharmacist in community. It was the worst job ever. The workload is crazy easily 60 hours a week with no lunch or tea break at all, constant abuse from patients/customers. You can never do enough for people.

Each day we would get 400+ prescriptions from a gp and people would be expecting their medication ready within 5mins..... literally not possible. Understand for antibiotics and emergencies but other than that no excuse. People see a little tiny shop and somehow expect we have 100.boxes of each type of medication at every strength and size in our stock room..... we arent amazon we have to physically order your medicine in from a distributor.... we have to manually type a label, collect it from the shelf and dispense it. Then the pharmacist has to do a clinical and accuracy check on it..... on every single medicine. The pharmacist has to check the dose and medicine appropriate for that patient and doesnt interact with other medications. This essential part of the job is completely missed or ignored by most people.

The amount of prescriptions we do on a daily basis has increased 70% in the last decade and on top of that pharmacists are expected to provide so many other services such as vaccinations, bp checks, medical advice, contraception, smoking cessation, viagra, medicine services.... it is never ending. On top of that you are expected to run a business, turn a profit, hit targets and manage a staff and generally with no training other than your degree.

The pay and working conditions are horrendous... I mean should be illegal and are most definitely dangerous. 1 mistake can kill a person and there is no safety net.

I took a 10grand pay cut just to leave because it was that bad and I've never looked back.

I dont know many people I qualified with who are still doing the job because of what we had to put up with. The toll on your mental and physical health is awful. I dont know a single pharmacist who hasn't been threatened with violence.

I have cleaned up sick in nightclub floors and had classes thrown at me in pubs and I'd easily do that before becoming a community pharmacist again.

Everyone is leaving the job and I dont blame them in the slightest. Getting screamed at for things outside your control 5 times a day is wearing and thankless.

I now work in the NHS and find conditions here to be spectacular compared to where I came from.

Also the NHS advice about speaking to a pharmacist acts as if the pharmacist is actually available to see you....

I generally cant tell you anymore info about your verruca or cough than what the HCA can.... they are very well trained and also trained to know when to refer to me.

As a CP you are stuck between a rock and a hard place the nhs, business owners and patients put and unbelievable and unrealistic expectation on you.... it is mor sustainable and it is now failing