anyone else out there as depressed as me

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downandout

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I like helping people but it's the pressure i can't stand. I can't stand the noisy, out of control work enviroment. The frequent interruptions to go jab someone with a flu shot. Used to work for CVS years ago and i almost jumped off a cliff after work one day. I left and went to a grocery pharmacy. It started off good and for about 4 years, it was a sane work enviroment. Enough work to keep you on your feet all day but little breaks in between for you to have lunch or a snack. Now, things have drastically changed. It's all about the metrics now. My supervisor is breathing down my neck but my conscience won't let me verify at the speed of light and then make mistakes. I know almost everyone of my customers by name (at least 250 scripts a day) and everytime i'm tempted to rush through the verification, i keep thinking i'll make a mistake and hurt my customers. This job has been hell for me for the past 7 months. I cry a lot, i don't socialise outside work anymore 'cos i'm always worried about work. Lately, i've been wondering if ending my life would be a good solution for the stress. I've added 60 pounds in the past 7 months, my doctors keep telling me to lose the weight or suffer but i can't help myself. Everyday after work, i just want to go home, cry and immerse my sorrows in a larger tub of ice cream. I wonder if i can take a leave of absence now or just quit and start all over. Right now, if i can find a job that pays $50000 a year, i'll be happy. I just can't take retail pharmacy anymore:(
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downandout said:
Right now, if i can find a job that pays $50000 a year, i'll be happy. I just can't take retail pharmacy anymore:(
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Try to find a hospital job, it's been known to be less stressful than retail. Or, you can ask your district manager to transfer you to a slower store.
 
I wanna say "obvious troll is obvious" but in case this is real: dude you should know better than to talk about taking your own life on a message board. :eek:

My advice is to seek some counseling and reach out to friends/family. There's no shame in doing it and it might do you plenty of good.
 
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Oh please, i'm not going to take my life. Can't do that to my family. Besides, my religion doesn't believe in that. It's just that sometimes, after about 2 hours of crying non-stop after work, i wonder if this misery would ever end. I just can't see the light at the end of the tunnel in retail pharmacy. Seriously considering telling my PCP about this aspect of my life
 
downandout said:
I like helping people but it's the pressure i can't stand. I can't stand the noisy, out of control work enviroment. The frequent interruptions to go jab someone with a flu shot. Used to work for CVS years ago and i almost jumped off a cliff after work one day. I left and went to a grocery pharmacy. It started off good and for about 4 years, it was a sane work enviroment. Enough work to keep you on your feet all day but little breaks in between for you to have lunch or a snack. Now, things have drastically changed. It's all about the metrics now. My supervisor is breathing down my neck but my conscience won't let me verify at the speed of light and then make mistakes. I know almost everyone of my customers by name (at least 250 scripts a day) and everytime i'm tempted to rush through the verification, i keep thinking i'll make a mistake and hurt my customers. This job has been hell for me for the past 7 months. I cry a lot, i don't socialise outside work anymore 'cos i'm always worried about work. Lately, i've been wondering if ending my life would be a good solution for the stress. I've added 60 pounds in the past 7 months, my doctors keep telling me to lose the weight or suffer but i can't help myself. Everyday after work, i just want to go home, cry and immerse my sorrows in a larger tub of ice cream. I wonder if i can take a leave of absence now or just quit and start all over. Right now, if i can find a job that pays $50000 a year, i'll be happy. I just can't take retail pharmacy anymore:(
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you were saying?
 
But hey if you didn't really mean it, then I'm relieved because it's not something to casually throw around, even on the internet.
 
You should definitely do something. Work part-time, work for less money, do something. Don't just stand there and take it. Go to another field if you have to. Go do consulting or work for a pharmaceutical company or just be a biology technician for f's sake. Or even teaching. Just find an avenue to give you some time to clear your mind. Or even quit if your family won't suffer too much.

And you are completely right. Making $50,000 and being happy is infinitely better than making $100,000 and being unhappy.
 
I'm sorry, i shouldn't throw that phrase around.My apologies. I didn't actually mean that i would go through with it. I just wonder if this helpless depressed feeling is unique to me. I wonder if there are any retail pharmacists that feel like they are trapped in a lose lose situation. This job gets me so depressed that on my off ways, i wouldn't even drive past my workplace. The sight of the car park at my grocery store gets me sad and depressed. Currently looking for a new job but i wonder if i should talk to my doctor about anti-depressants just to cope
 
downandout said:
I'm sorry, i shouldn't throw that phrase around.My apologies. I didn't actually mean that i would go through with it. I just wonder if this helpless depressed feeling is unique to me. I wonder if there are any retail pharmacists that feel like they are trapped in a lose lose situation. This job gets me so depressed that on my off ways, i wouldn't even drive past my workplace. The sight of the car park at my grocery store gets me sad and depressed. Currently looking for a new job but i wonder if i should talk to my doctor about anti-depressants just to cope
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These are not normal feelings. Please talk with your doctor about this aspect of your life and make plans to get yourself out of a retail pharmacy and into a better situation for you.
 
I work for CVS. I hate my job. I hate every minute of it. I'll be here as long as I can take the pressure and stress. When I can't anymore, I'm leaving.

You should talk to a doctor, or a therapist, or a counselor or someone who can help you figure out what you have to do..

The solution may be simpler than all that.. Save up enough money to leave your current place of employment and find a job in the hospital setting.
 
OP - I have been in your shoes before. And the same thoughts. I had a relatively high-paid job (in a high-tech field, not in Pharmacy) and the stress that goes with it.

Have you taken stock of your financial situation to see if you can downshift to part-time work? That would reduce your stress and give you more time to look for something else.

And I know this is trite, but try to exercise. It'll be awfully hard at first, but if you keep at it you'll feel much better. Exercise saved my life. Literally.
 
If you feel that miserable at work, the only way out is working for a different company (not retail). I did retail right out of school and I felt the same way everyday. After 4 years of working as a retail pharmacist, I found a non-retail job with some pay cut but I was still happier. Retail is not for everyone and retail is definitely NOT for you. All you have to do now is to search for a new job and move on. Your life will change then and you will be happy again for sure:)
 
You sound like me when I was an intern. I just don't think retail pharmacy is the right place for everyone. Time to find a new job, whether it's pharmacy related or not. I am willing to bet most of your woes are job related and will disappear when the job does (but if they don't, then yeah...time to go see a therapist).
 
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Everyone, you have to realize that retail pharmacy is a business and it's all about making money. If you have a conscience and you're looking for that warm fuzzy feeling that you get from helping paitents, and practicing 'clinical pharmacy', you're not going to find it in retail, and you're probably going to burn out like the OP.

The way to survive in retail is to get with the program. It's like a person would not make a good soldier if their conscience got in the way, debating the morality of killing someone. No, a good soldier does what they are ordered to do, does whatever it takes to survive, and futhermore, wants to be the best at whatever they are told to do.

So when your supervisor tells you to do more flushots, verify faster, whatever, just do it, and motivate yourself by trying to be the best at it. If you don't think like this, retail is going to eat you alive.
 
If this isn't a troll post, which I think it is, you have 2 options. Stay in your first world problem retail job that is surely paying you a hell of a lot more than other aspects of pharmacy practice, or apply for the next round of residency spots next year.

The odds of you getting hired in a hospital setting as a staff RPh after doing retail for five years is almost zero, so you can do that and take a $100,000 paycut for your resident year then start looking for hospital work after or stick it out making that fat retail cash. The way I see it, for what they are paying retail pharmacists the job better be stressful as hell, im sick of hearing you retail RPhs complain about your working conditions when you're making likely more than $120,000 a year working 40 hour work weeks. Cry me a river. :rolleyes:
 
Trent Steele they aren't 40 hr weeks anymore. When you factor in coming in early,staying late,conference calls,commute time and mandatory meetings on your day off it works out to more like 55-60. They pile the work on you to a point that if you don't stay you will get fired for not meeting the stupid metrics.
 
Unchained said:
Trent Steele they aren't 40 hr weeks anymore. When you factor in coming in early,staying late,conference calls,commute time and mandatory meetings on your day off it works out to more like 55-60. They pile the work on you to a point that if you don't stay you will get fired for not meeting the stupid metrics.
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But it's really not to the point of someone wanting to kill themself. If the stress is too much as a staff pharmacist, ask to float. I have met a lot of ex-rmx who float now. I worked with one who has been a pharmacist for 35 yrs and he is a floater now. He has done it all and figured out that floating is the best thing for him.
I remember when one of my friends used to be a RMX at WAG. She was so miserable. I adviced her to just tell them she doesn't want to be a manager anymore.
You can also go work for an independent pharmacy if you don't mind dispensing Norco and Soma all day long. No one should feel the way you are feeling about their job.
 
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Unchained said:
Trent Steele they aren't 40 hr weeks anymore. When you factor in coming in early,staying late,conference calls,commute time and mandatory meetings on your day off it works out to more like 55-60. They pile the work on you to a point that if you don't stay you will get fired for not meeting the stupid metrics.
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I just started at a grocery chain last week... I wish someone would have warned me about this!!!
 
I used to work for cvs so I know how you feel. They don't care about loyalty but all about metrics. If you don't perform when you get older, the tech and supervisor see you as old and useless and will talk about you and will make you become a floater. It's already hard dealing with the workload and difficult customers but the corporate attitudes towards pharmacist is we are replaceable. That's why so many good pharmacist I know switch to greener pasteur such as county and hospital.

I used to think that as you accumulated experience, you become more valuable but that's only true in hospital. With the increasing pharmacist graduating from school and more metrics coming out each and every year, it's gonna get worse. I switched to hospital and gained the experiences to make me more of a rounded pharmacist and it's the best professional decision I ever made. After benefits, the pay difference is really negligible.

Best of luck to you.
 
I work nights. I have no real complaints other than the general "insurance companies are useless" thing, but not having to deal with the typical day shift insanity or the hospital issues like medication reconciliation sheets and bitchy nurses makes me rather content with my position. I'd recommend you try it out. Plus, I make more money than just about everybody. I think I've already made like $95k this year as of today's pay stub.

Night shift...I'm telling you...look into it.
 
Unchained said:
Trent Steele they aren't 40 hr weeks anymore. When you factor in coming in early,staying late,conference calls,commute time and mandatory meetings on your day off it works out to more like 55-60. They pile the work on you to a point that if you don't stay you will get fired for not meeting the stupid metrics.
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Im pretty sure that no staff chain drugstore pharmacists are on salary. I don't know about mgmt, but pretty sure that my friends that work retail get paid an extra $4 an hour up to 44 hours, then get paid their regular wage thereafter. So these staffers are getting paid >$60 an hour for 50-60 hour work weeks. That is farking huge money! Not to mention that some of the new grads are struggling to get more than 30 hours. $100,000 for a 30 hour workweek? SOMEBODY BETTER CALL THE WAAAMBULANCE! #firstworldproblemstothemax
 
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Trent Steele said:
Im pretty sure that no staff chain drugstore pharmacists are on salary. I don't know about mgmt, but pretty sure that my friends that work retail get paid an extra $4 an hour up to 44 hours, then get paid their regular wage thereafter. So these staffers are getting paid >$60 an hour for 50-60 hour work weeks. That is farking huge money! Not to mention that some of the new grads are struggling to get more than 30 hours. $100,000 for a 30 hour workweek? SOMEBODY BETTER CALL THE WAAAMBULANCE! #firstworldproblemstothemax
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You are an insensitive prick, and know jack **** apparently. OPs post reminds me of my wife. She is a floater with splits, and while not salaried, she is not allowed to put in the hours she works. Extra hours just don't get added. WAG is crushing her. She is under constant pressure to meet metrics, will be written up for anything, and is tacitly reminded that there are pharmacists out there who would take her job in heart beat. If she doesn't like it, then why not leave? To where? Another retail chain that will have the same problems? But with less seniority? To a non-existant hospital opening for someone wit no hospital experience? The market is saturated to the point there is a whole lot of nothing. Those student loans aren't going to pay themselves. So she is going to stick with it, cry herself to sleep most nights, pray she doesn't kill someone (and if she does the chains will throw her ass under the bus), and we are going to put all of our money into paying off student loans. After that she is going to quit any try to get a job doing something, anything else.

When she started (7 years ago) it wasn't like this. She liked retail then, it was all she wanted to do. The pharmacists she worked under as a tech were somewhat happy, and were able to help people occasionally. They had time to know their patients. Now it is different. With the market becoming saturated and reimbursement dropping, the chains have all the excuse they need to work their pharmacists like rented mules. Ignoring it by saying it is just retail is a terrible idea. What happens in retail will affect everyone. The entire reason salaries are over 100k in the first place was retail demand. If they drop in retail they will plummet everywhere else. Already are in some cases. A DOP friend of mine at a hospital outside Chicago just hired an experienced staff pharmacist for 80k per year...full time. Retail pharmacists are the true face of this profession, as the vast majority of the public sees a pharmacist as ONLY that. ASHP can do all the marketing it wants, but the vast majority of the public will still think retail is all we do. If retail pharmacists are being run so ragged they can't do much of anything the public perception of pharmacists will change negatively...which affects all of us. It will be awful hard to get congress to consider us providers, or to expand our scope of practice if the public thinks we are all incompetent.

This is a rambling post, but all the people who think OPs post is a troll probably haven't been inside a chain in a while. That feeling is far more common than you want to think.
 
Trent Steele said:
Im pretty sure that no staff chain drugstore pharmacists are on salary. I don't know about mgmt, but pretty sure that my friends that work retail get paid an extra $4 an hour up to 44 hours, then get paid their regular wage thereafter. So these staffers are getting paid >$60 an hour for 50-60 hour work weeks. That is farking huge money! Not to mention that some of the new grads are struggling to get more than 30 hours. $100,000 for a 30 hour workweek? SOMEBODY BETTER CALL THE WAAAMBULANCE! #firstworldproblemstothemax
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there are making like 75-80k but I get your point :laugh:
 
downandout said:
I like helping people but it's the pressure i can't stand. I can't stand the noisy, out of control work enviroment. The frequent interruptions to go jab someone with a flu shot. Used to work for CVS years ago and i almost jumped off a cliff after work one day. I left and went to a grocery pharmacy. It started off good and for about 4 years, it was a sane work enviroment. Enough work to keep you on your feet all day but little breaks in between for you to have lunch or a snack. Now, things have drastically changed. It's all about the metrics now. My supervisor is breathing down my neck but my conscience won't let me verify at the speed of light and then make mistakes. I know almost everyone of my customers by name (at least 250 scripts a day) and everytime i'm tempted to rush through the verification, i keep thinking i'll make a mistake and hurt my customers. This job has been hell for me for the past 7 months. I cry a lot, i don't socialise outside work anymore 'cos i'm always worried about work. Lately, i've been wondering if ending my life would be a good solution for the stress. I've added 60 pounds in the past 7 months, my doctors keep telling me to lose the weight or suffer but i can't help myself. Everyday after work, i just want to go home, cry and immerse my sorrows in a larger tub of ice cream. I wonder if i can take a leave of absence now or just quit and start all over. Right now, if i can find a job that pays $50000 a year, i'll be happy. I just can't take retail pharmacy anymore:(
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First thing i think you need to do is take a stand and explain why metrics aren't met if it's due to staffing issues, etc. If they don't like that then so be it just do your job and accuracy is the most important.
Secondly, what i think would be a great alternative would be to go part time or work less like if you work 3 to 4 days you can still pull in 50-80k which gives you alot of rest and money. If you are stable financially then think about working less and being more happy.
 
downandout said:
I like helping people but it's the pressure i can't stand. I can't stand the noisy, out of control work enviroment. The frequent interruptions to go jab someone with a flu shot. Used to work for CVS years ago and i almost jumped off a cliff after work one day. I left and went to a grocery pharmacy. It started off good and for about 4 years, it was a sane work enviroment. Enough work to keep you on your feet all day but little breaks in between for you to have lunch or a snack. Now, things have drastically changed. It's all about the metrics now. My supervisor is breathing down my neck but my conscience won't let me verify at the speed of light and then make mistakes. I know almost everyone of my customers by name (at least 250 scripts a day) and everytime i'm tempted to rush through the verification, i keep thinking i'll make a mistake and hurt my customers. This job has been hell for me for the past 7 months. I cry a lot, i don't socialise outside work anymore 'cos i'm always worried about work. Lately, i've been wondering if ending my life would be a good solution for the stress. I've added 60 pounds in the past 7 months, my doctors keep telling me to lose the weight or suffer but i can't help myself. Everyday after work, i just want to go home, cry and immerse my sorrows in a larger tub of ice cream. I wonder if i can take a leave of absence now or just quit and start all over. Right now, if i can find a job that pays $50000 a year, i'll be happy. I just can't take retail pharmacy anymore:(
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I also like helping people, but retail is very stressful. I hope you have some tech help with 250 a day. I have been pretty depressed too but not as depressed as you. Retail can be very draining. I feel like all I do is work, and when I'm not at work I am thinking about how bad it is at work. I haven't been crying every night, but a few times I did because of stress. I also gained may be 15-20 lbs, I know I should be exercising, but I'm too tired to exercise after work. There were times a feel like it doesn't matter if I died, but I wouldn't end my life because of work. It's just not worth it!

What I do now is try to focus on the good (coworkers I like working with, patients I enjoy talking to, etc), and put more effort in doing fun things outside of work instead of staying home all the time (I usually don't leave my house when I have the weekend off). If you have an HR team you should talk to them. They should have resources for you in this type of situation. Depression should be a valid reason for sick leave or short term disability. You should take a break away from work. Please talk to your HR, they should be on your side. Good luck :luck:
 
WVUPharm2007 said:
I work nights. I have no real complaints other than the general "insurance companies are useless" thing, but not having to deal with the typical day shift insanity or the hospital issues like medication reconciliation sheets and bitchy nurses makes me rather content with my position. I'd recommend you try it out. Plus, I make more money than just about everybody. I think I've already made like $95k this year as of today's pay stub.

Night shift...I'm telling you...look into it.
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Yeah, I used to work the day shift in retail and I hated it so much that I started looking for a job elsewhere, but now that I've moved to the nightshift, there's NO way you could make me go back to doing dayshift and I actually like my job more. Even when asked to take dayshifts, I refuse to do so because I can't stand the complaints of customers and constant phone ringing and other BS dayshift people have to deal with. I don't mind the calls at night about people who have legitimate concerns about their medicines. It's just better and calmer at night and obviously having 7 days off is awesome. People complain about working the 7 days on, but when you have so many scripts to help fill for the dayshift, the 10-12 hr shift goes by so fast. Another bonus of the nightshift: when you take a week off, it's really 3 weeks off :cool:
 
I work part-time at CVS and I have to say that I don't know how people can handle that full-time. Retail pharmacy is not bad, it's the metric crap that gets me and the 14-hour shift is just too much.

If you are ok with making just $50K a year, why don't you work part-time and maybe go back to school? Pharmacy didn't use to be this way and it is just getting worse and worse.
 
downandout said:
I like helping people but it's the pressure i can't stand. I can't stand the noisy, out of control work enviroment. The frequent interruptions to go jab someone with a flu shot. Used to work for CVS years ago and i almost jumped off a cliff after work one day. I left and went to a grocery pharmacy. It started off good and for about 4 years, it was a sane work enviroment. Enough work to keep you on your feet all day but little breaks in between for you to have lunch or a snack. Now, things have drastically changed. It's all about the metrics now. My supervisor is breathing down my neck but my conscience won't let me verify at the speed of light and then make mistakes. I know almost everyone of my customers by name (at least 250 scripts a day) and everytime i'm tempted to rush through the verification, i keep thinking i'll make a mistake and hurt my customers. This job has been hell for me for the past 7 months. I cry a lot, i don't socialise outside work anymore 'cos i'm always worried about work. Lately, i've been wondering if ending my life would be a good solution for the stress. I've added 60 pounds in the past 7 months, my doctors keep telling me to lose the weight or suffer but i can't help myself. Everyday after work, i just want to go home, cry and immerse my sorrows in a larger tub of ice cream. I wonder if i can take a leave of absence now or just quit and start all over. Right now, if i can find a job that pays $50000 a year, i'll be happy. I just can't take retail pharmacy anymore:(
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No, you are not alone .The feelings you have right now I will call them classical retail syndrome. Get yourself out of this situation nothing in life is worth living like this. If leaving makes you happy make a decision if you think your situation can change by changing store or shifts do that . Don't wait otherwise everyday you will lose a part of yourself and no amount of money is worth living a miserable life.

Hey Mountain where are you? You and I share one thing that is our hate for retail.
 
When I first started, I was very depressed and cried a lot when I got home from work. I considered committing suicide as well just so I can be freed from retail. I had a bad partner and the worst techs ever. All of the techs were very slow and incompetent, so we were always backed up and I had to do everything myself since they were so bad. I would come in a few hours early and stay a few hours late just to catch up. I asked my DM if I can float and he refused, so at one point I was very close to telling my DM that I wanted to work part time just so I can be released from my store, but I stuck it out a little longer to see if things would get better because I had loans to pay back. Things got better once my partner was terminated and I was forced to be PIC. I terminated all the bad techs and hired new ones, and I also got a new partner, who is pretty good. Now things aren't as bad as before, but I still want to leave retail if I can ever find another job. I've been applying for non-retail jobs for the past 2 years and haven't gotten anywhere probably because I only have retail experience, no hospital...

If things are that bad for you in retail, have you thought about maybe applying to hospitals in the rural areas and consider moving? I was only able to get job offers for a hospital that was willing to train me in the rural areas that no one wants to live in. Or like everyone said, drop to part time and spend the extra time looking for other jobs.
 
rx2010 said:
When I first started, I was very depressed and cried a lot when I got home from work. I considered committing suicide as well just so I can be freed from retail.
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Wassup with retail and suicide? I hope you are not serious though. You should just quit and move on. You are still better off than most people. Better yet, get a job at an independent. Less pay but less stress.
 
Op, I feel your pain,and i have sympathy for you. When i first started to work for wags as a floater, i used to dread going to work to a busy 24 hours store. Now that i have more experience and i am working at a less busy store, i am able to handle the workload better. However, it does get hectic at times as we don't really have adequate staffing. We only have 30 tech hours. On Thursday, which was my 12 hours day, we did about 185 with only 6 tech hours. It is tough as i got to do mostly everything ,and it is non stop from the minute i step in the pharmacy until close. We got to do flu shots, zostavax shots, and adherence calls, and i do fall behing sometimes.
Well, if you feel you are really depressed, you may try to find another job or ask to transfer to another store. Your qualify of life is too important to give it away. Good luck
 
ancienbon said:
Op, I feel your pain,and i have sympathy for you. When i first started to work for wags as a floater, i used to dread going to work to a busy 24 hours store. Now that i have more experience and i am working at a less busy store, i am able to handle the workload better. However, it does get hectic at times as we don't really have adequate staffing. We only have 30 tech hours. On Thursday, which was my 12 hours day, we did about 185 with only 6 tech hours. It is tough as i got to do mostly everything ,and it is non stop from the minute i step in the pharmacy until close. We got to do flu shots, zostavax shots, and adherence calls, and i do fall behing sometimes.
Well, if you feel you are really depressed, you may try to find another job or ask to transfer to another store. Your qualify of life is too important to give it away. Good luck
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This is nuts, doing 185 with 6 tech hours. I know Walgeens computer system is great, but with all the vaccinations you have to give, how do you even keep all those vaccines straight? Every time when I drive by a Walgreens I wonder about that. Did you all really get extra training with all the vaccines you are giving? We only got the basic flu and subq vaccination techniques on adults. With this kind of tech hours, do they still make you do new rollouts/programs? I don't remember doing very much or anything else other than filling scripts when I was at CVS. I guess we all just need to hang in there for now. :luck:
 
clachan3 said:
This is nuts, doing 185 with 6 tech hours. I know Walgeens computer system is great, but with all the vaccinations you have to give, how do you even keep all those vaccines straight? Every time when I drive by a Walgreens I wonder about that. Did you all really get extra training with all the vaccines you are giving? We only got the basic flu and subq vaccination techniques on adults. With this kind of tech hours, do they still make you do new rollouts/programs? I don't remember doing very much or anything else other than filling scripts when I was at CVS. I guess we all just need to hang in there for now. :luck:
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Yeah, it is tough , i can tell you. It is a matter of time before a pharmacist makes serious mistakes. We usually give the shots on the run, as we are busy with filling, drive thru and others tasks. -oh i forgot to mention MTM too. With 6 tech hours, we do also have to do 7 days call list, and delete. The tech comes at 12 h 30 and leaves at 7.We did do some basic training for the zostavax, a 2 hours training. of course, we dont really have time to really assess the patients. The pneumonia shot is similar to the flu shot as fas as the injection site., and dose.
The big guys only care about the metrcs. -oh i forgot to mention we have to sell psc cards every day too.. I heard beginning next month, we will get more tech hours . Fingers crossed.
A customer once asked me if he could get a knee replacement too while getting his flu hot. . He was joking. ... He saw how busy i was doing everything, and there was 4 people waiting for flu shots.
 
ancienbon said:
Op, I feel your pain,and i have sympathy for you. When i first started to work for wags as a floater, i used to dread going to work to a busy 24 hours store. Now that i have more experience and i am working at a less busy store, i am able to handle the workload better. However, it does get hectic at times as we don't really have adequate staffing. We only have 30 tech hours. On Thursday, which was my 12 hours day, we did about 185 with only 6 tech hours. It is tough as i got to do mostly everything ,and it is non stop from the minute i step in the pharmacy until close. We got to do flu shots, zostavax shots, and adherence calls, and i do fall behing sometimes.
Well, if you feel you are really depressed, you may try to find another job or ask to transfer to another store. Your qualify of life is too important to give it away. Good luck
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no way....I work at a different retail store I do 165 daily and have at least 11 hrs of tech help on a 12 hour shift ..thats something to report about. Unless you have that robot at your store...:laugh:
 
GodsSon2011 said:
no way....I work at a different retail store I do 165 daily and have at least 11 hrs of tech help on a 12 hour shift ..thats something to report about. Unless you have that robot at your store...:laugh:
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It is true. Last year at this time, we had 3 techs and about 78 tech hours. Now we have one tech and only 30 hours. We lost lot of express script patients, but to decrease our tech hour from 78 to 30 is ridiculous. With the flu shot seasons, and zostavax , it gets busy, and it is non stop.
 
fattunesy said:
You are an insensitive prick, and know jack **** apparently. OPs post reminds me of my wife. She is a floater with splits, and while not salaried, she is not allowed to put in the hours she works. Extra hours just don't get added. WAG is crushing her. She is under constant pressure to meet metrics, will be written up for anything, and is tacitly reminded that there are pharmacists out there who would take her job in heart beat. If she doesn't like it, then why not leave? To where? Another retail chain that will have the same problems? But with less seniority? To a non-existant hospital opening for someone wit no hospital experience? The market is saturated to the point there is a whole lot of nothing. Those student loans aren't going to pay themselves. So she is going to stick with it, cry herself to sleep most nights, pray she doesn't kill someone (and if she does the chains will throw her ass under the bus), and we are going to put all of our money into paying off student loans. After that she is going to quit any try to get a job doing something, anything else.

When she started (7 years ago) it wasn't like this. She liked retail then, it was all she wanted to do. The pharmacists she worked under as a tech were somewhat happy, and were able to help people occasionally. They had time to know their patients. Now it is different. With the market becoming saturated and reimbursement dropping, the chains have all the excuse they need to work their pharmacists like rented mules. Ignoring it by saying it is just retail is a terrible idea. What happens in retail will affect everyone. The entire reason salaries are over 100k in the first place was retail demand. If they drop in retail they will plummet everywhere else. Already are in some cases. A DOP friend of mine at a hospital outside Chicago just hired an experienced staff pharmacist for 80k per year...full time. Retail pharmacists are the true face of this profession, as the vast majority of the public sees a pharmacist as ONLY that. ASHP can do all the marketing it wants, but the vast majority of the public will still think retail is all we do. If retail pharmacists are being run so ragged they can't do much of anything the public perception of pharmacists will change negatively...which affects all of us. It will be awful hard to get congress to consider us providers, or to expand our scope of practice if the public thinks we are all incompetent.

This is a rambling post, but all the people who think OPs post is a troll probably haven't been inside a chain in a while. That feeling is far more common than you want to think.
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No offense, but if the water gets too hot, you better get out. Oh the job is stressful? Do people expect $120,000 salary jobs to be cushy? I have no sympathy for those crying about retail, they knew what they were getting into, but the bonuses offered years ago and the prospect of huge salaries today are just too good to pass up for many. Especially for those working part time, getting paid $60 an hour is ridiculous. They have nothing to cry themselves to sleep about! You can't handle the metrics?

Guess what a kid that just graduated is seeing those dollar signs and will gladly meet the metrics, regardless of how ridiculous they are.
Crying over a $60 an hour? Makes me sick. Try laying asphalt all day long in 100 degree weather like my brothers for crap money then come call me an insensitive prick for mocking you people complaining about a wage that pays them more than 90% of the population.


Op and your wife did not have to get into retail after finishing school, but I am sure the lucrative nature of the retail business lured them over other areas of practice. Students go on rotation, they know what a particular field is like before getting into it. The work sucks but the pay is great. Even if they aren't getting paid time and a half or getting paid at all for over 40 hours, $120,000 is just stupid big money, even if you are working 40-60 hours a week. I don't care what you think, anyone that complains about this is just plain lazy. Period.

I see you're in Chicago, care to meet up and discuss the matter in person? Preferably with childish name calling though, I don't take very kindly to it. I live by the subway, so I can meet anywhere :D Pharmacy is a small world, perhaps my hospital system is hiring an outpatient pharmacist?
 
I know few high earning professionals who spend the bulk of their working day running around like a chicken with its head cut off.
 
Free yourself.

After working full-time for a few years I moved to a saturated city and could not find full-time gigs I wanted. So I went and looked for part-time gigs and got work at two independent pharmacies. One was compounding pharmacy, even though I had experience, the manager said he would have trained anyone who was interested. Also I saw a vet compounding pharmacy hiring for two days a week and it is more verifying than compounding (which the techs do). I supplemented that with a rehab hospital weekend gig that is pretty fairly okay and never hectic. (and we don't do IVs so I didn't need IV experience). Sure I sacrificed benefits, but my quality of life went thru the roof. I spend part of my week freelance writing, something I couldn't do when I was fulltime.
 
Trent Steele said:
Crying over a $60 an hour? Makes me sick. Try laying asphalt all day long in 100 degree weather like my brothers for crap money then come call me an insensitive prick for mocking you people complaining about a wage that pays them more than 90% of the population.
Click to expand...

No matter how good some people have it they will always complain. No matter how bad some people have it they will always be smiling.

I think a lot of it has to do with relativity. If you came from a crap background and you now are making the big bucks in a nice, clean, temperature controlled and well lit environment then you think you are in heaven. If you were born into a rich family and you are an elitist snob that never had to touch a trash bag in their life then ya you will complain about almost any career.
 
WVUPharm2007 said:
I work nights. I have no real complaints other than the general "insurance companies are useless" thing, but not having to deal with the typical day shift insanity or the hospital issues like medication reconciliation sheets and bitchy nurses makes me rather content with my position. I'd recommend you try it out. Plus, I make more money than just about everybody. I think I've already made like $95k this year as of today's pay stub.

Night shift...I'm telling you...look into it.
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Thats pretty good pay. How many hours a week do you work? And whats with the suicide talk in this thread? I use to work day shift for CVS doing 500+ plus daily...sucked ass. But i just quit. CVS or any chain is NOT worth taking your life. I suggest any of you thinking of suicide get over it, get some help, and move on. It can never be that bad.
 
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