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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

to be annoyed at pharmacist?

87 replies

PavlovtheCat · 20/12/2011 16:36

DS is poorly. Has high fever, limp and really needs some medicine. Saw GP yeterday who gave me a prescription for paracetamol as I am almost out of calpol. Very nice of her, thank you.

I asked her if I could have whatever one it was that was not green/yellow as this makes the children gag and they refuse it, DS in particular being only 2. She said it was whatever the pharmacy have.

So, go to pharmacy today as out of calpol. They have on the shelf Calpol, and some generic stuff. I tell them that he won't take the green stuff, but will take the strawberry one fine (I know they do both of these in generic form, as we have had it before).

She telle me they get it from supplier in whatever form it comes in and I have to have whatever they have available - the other pharmacist assures me it is not the green one, but a pleasant tasting banana flavour one. So she reaches up next to the calpol bottle and decants this generic one.

And it is the bloody green one. I get home, don't need to give kids medicine right away as still covered from last dose. DH goes to work where is now until midnight or so.

I have stinking cold and have put my back out, pushchair is in the back of the car, and I have a poorly child in desperate need of medicine who has just spat the entire syringe of medicine all over me and himself.

Why could she not just give me the bloody calpol in the absence of the generic strawberry flavour! FFS.

I am being unreasonable aren't i? I should not accept a fussy child should I? i should not complain about getting free medicine should i? well i normally buy it, and if I had known it was the green stuff i would have just bought the calpol

OP posts:
NeuromanticisedVisionsofXmas · 20/12/2011 17:08

I'm not vicious, I'm just jealous*. If you had to pay 5o quid for your child to see a doctor every time they were sick, and then pay full price for any medicine, you'd say the same.

*at least I'm honest Xmas Wink

Original poster
PavlovtheCat · 20/12/2011 17:09

I can still taste/smell it on my fingers and top, it really is rancid!

OP posts:
Original poster
PavlovtheCat · 20/12/2011 17:10

neuro but I do pay for it, just not directly at source. I pay for it each month over years and years and years and have done my entire adult life.

OP posts:
Sirzy · 20/12/2011 17:15

Antibiotics are different though if a child really won't take it then of course an alternative should be given.

With paracetamol you have what's given or buy your own! Ds prefers medinol to calpol but when it is prescribed he has whatever he is given!

Rinkadinkpink · 20/12/2011 17:15

Go to the chemist and buy your own calpol like everyone else does! I cant believe you would waste a docs appointment on that.

Just shove it down the back of his throat and hold his nose-then he will have no choice but to take it.

Original poster
PavlovtheCat · 20/12/2011 17:21

rinkapink what do you mean waste a docs appt on that? you mean taking a child with fever of 40 for three days to a doc to make sure all is ok? oh yeah real waste of time. If you read the post properly, you would see that I already stated I normally buy my own. comment on my post and call me unreasonable if you wish, I did ask if I was being, but please do not make assumptions about me based on nought. I have not ever stated I went to the gp for calpol.

OP posts:
Original poster
PavlovtheCat · 20/12/2011 17:22

sirzy medinol, yes that is what he normally has. the generic calpol. This is not that.

OP posts:
LineRunnerCrouchingReindeer · 20/12/2011 17:23

I feel sorry for you, especially getting a bashing on here for taking your sick child to a doctor and collecting a prescription.

Some of these liquid suspensions for children are truly fucking vile, and a lot of adults would gag on them. So there. Xmas Smile

And why oh why is Calpol such a bloody rip-off anyway?

Original poster
PavlovtheCat · 20/12/2011 17:23

i do love a bit of nastiness though. deck the halls with spikes of holly and all that!

OP posts:
Feminine · 20/12/2011 17:23

Is he a bit better today? :)

Original poster
PavlovtheCat · 20/12/2011 17:25

line thank you. I can take the bashing though. I did ask for it! I am not so impressed about suggestions that I wasted my time taking him to gp. Luckily the doc is a very sympathetic one, and told me to go back any time if I continued to be worried. It is her opinion I care about regarding whether I wasted my time or not, so I shall just ignore those comments now Smile

OP posts:
Original poster
PavlovtheCat · 20/12/2011 17:27

feminine, no, it was today I collected the prescription. Did not need it yesterday as prescribed as still has some that I bought with my very own cash.

Not better today no. He is a miserable clingy little boy with constant temp who won't take his medicine.

OP posts:
NeuromanticisedVisionsofXmas · 20/12/2011 17:32

Well, you don't really, and you don't pay anymore in tax and social contributions than I do (relatively), so my point still stands.

Feminine · 20/12/2011 17:32

Oh, sorry thought it was last night.

Hope he gets better very soon :)

Feminine · 20/12/2011 17:35

Neuro now, if you find yourself without any money and need DC medicine ask your Doctor!

Doctors will write scripts for painkillers for children...happens all the time.

pav was quite within her rights to ask...you will be too :)

Original poster
PavlovtheCat · 20/12/2011 17:37

feminine i did not ask the gp either. She asked me if I had enough paracetamol at home and I said I had about 4 doses left. So she wrote me prescription for more.

OP posts:
NeuromanticisedVisionsofXmas · 20/12/2011 17:38

I'm not in the UK Fem, I would have thought that was obvious once I said we paid for doctors and medicines?

Cankulzof · 20/12/2011 17:42

I'd be annoyed too, but I'd stick the horrible stuff in a warm squash or milk and get it down him that way. Then he gets fluids too.

deepandcrispandsevenfold · 20/12/2011 17:44

yanbu
but I would in future ask your doctor to name the brand.
chemists can't just give you calpol as it is more expensive,
tbh I would just buy the one my child would take

Feminine · 20/12/2011 17:47

So I can see even less reason to be pissed off then Neuro Confused

For whats its worth nor am I. :)

Its just something that does go on in the UK, theres no point grumbling about something you can't do anything about.

Pav your doctor sounds very nice :)

Sirzy · 20/12/2011 17:53

If you want to specify the brand of calpol you are given then you pay. If your given it free you take what is given happy you don't have to pay!

sarahtigh · 20/12/2011 17:56

whether dentist or doctor you are not supposed to write prescriptions with brand name of drug but with technical name ie paracetamol not panadol or calpol,

there needs to be a clinical reason for not having standard tablets/medicine, some people need coated painkillers to prevent stomach ulcers etc, the rest of us don't

for future info ADSA paracetamol sugar free is pink and strawberryish!!

paddypoopants · 20/12/2011 17:59

What you need is paracetemol suppositries. I got them from the gp, although you can buy them here in the uk over the counter. They are brilliant as ds will not swallow medicine if he is ill enough to need it or if he does he always chucks it up about half an hour later. They are not hard to adminter and ds doesn't eem to mind much.

sashh · 21/12/2011 07:29

Have you tried holding his nose? Getting rid of the smell might make it tolerable, worth trying with the older one too.

ItsSnowDarling · 21/12/2011 07:41

YABU - calpol is no longer allowed on prescription because of the cost. If you want calpol then I am afraid you will have to pay for it.

As an aside if you have been given a yellow or green (struggling to think of a green paracetamol and I'm a pharmacist) paracetamol then i am guessing that your GP had prescribed a liquid or elixir and not a suspension. Most suspensions are strawberry flavour (occasionally cherry).

The truth is that there is no money in the NHS, you have to accept what the NHS will offer and it isn't calpol.