Arizona State replaces pharmacy with vending machine

[zelman]

Professional organisations generally look toward the goals of their largest contributors. In the case of pharmacy orgs, this is usually the large chains, which rarely, if ever, have the pharmacists' best interests at heart. However, I believe it is possible to sway the interests back in the favour of the pharmacist, if we are able to somehow assuage the apathy that is so prevalent in this profession. Pharmacists have to believe in themselves and push their talents in order to promote real change, and unfortunately, there are an awful lot of "I'm just here to make $100k counting pills" pharmacists in practice. If the people who physically do the job don't care about it, how can we expect it of anyone else? As for the unions, they are, by nature, designed to protect the weakest links and keep them working. This is fine for minimum wage labour jobs, but that is not pharmacy. Overall, pharmacists are an intelligent group, and we should be able to organise ourselves in such a way to promote our own well being and advance our practice. If we are unable to define our own role and make our own future, we don't deserve to move forward.

Do you think that increasing pharmacist membership will actually decrease the kowtowing to giant corporations? There are already 62,000 APhA members. How many more do they need to start standing up or pharmacists over pharmacies? If there is a critical mass where that will happen, I'll be member #62,001. However, I don't think that's the case.

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Members don't see this ad.

 

[oldstock]

Seriously imho the idea of a union of pharmacists is way better than messing with pharmacy organizations. At least a union will fight to guarantee you a good paycheck (albeit with a fee) vs. you paying membership dues to those organizations to receive mostly some magazines you do not even read

 

[BF7]

Pharmacists also need to fight to keep their current role. Do not support tech check tech. Do not support anything that takes away dispensing from a pharmacist's job duty.

If we get removed or pushed further on down in the dispensing process BEFORE we have a defined clinical role for which WE ARE ACTUALLY PAID FOR SERVICES WHICH WILL SUPPORT NOT JUST OUR OWN SALARY, BUT ALSO support a clinical services delivery business model (front end staff too) then our "profession" will have been dealt a blow that will be more paralyzing to our practice and more transformational than Humphrey-Durham was in it's time....Which essentially put us on the back of the healthcare bus by only allowing us to perform our professional task by order of a physician who wrote that order on a piece of paper designating it as an "Rx". Prior to that, patient's would come and see their 'druggist' for a variety of conditions and the 'druggist' had discretion and the compounding expertise to create a medicinal compound to relieve that patient's maladies.....Physicians were often seen for anatomical issues and surgery.

 

[confettiflyer]

Pharmacists also need to fight to keep their current role. Do not support tech check tech. Do not support anything that takes away dispensing from a pharmacist's job duty.

But I don't want to waste time with dispensing. Tech-check-tech was a godsend. No offense, but I have better things to do with my time and knowledge base.

 

[BF7]

But I don't want to waste time with dispensing. Tech-check-tech was a godsend. No offense, but I have better things to do with my time and knowledge base.

Please provide some examples of a billable service exclusive to our profession that supports your $120k+ per year salary.

 

[oldstock]

Please provide some examples of a billable service exclusive to our profession that supports your $120k+ per year salary.

Agreed. He prob got lucky to work some unicorn job and forgot that the majority of pharmacist job is in dispensing and retails. This is one example of what I call the "who cares" attitude (of course until they got hit and have to go begging for a job...)

 

[gwarm01]

I don't want to check cart, or pyxis or that boring crap either, but I would rather do that 25% of the time than being unemployed.

And sometimes it is a nice break.

After a week of working critical care it is nice to just sit down and sign off on saline flushes. Don't take that away from me.

 

[MountainPharmD]

Seriously imho the idea of a union of pharmacists is way better than messing with pharmacy organizations. At least a union will fight to guarantee you a good paycheck (albeit with a fee) vs. you paying membership dues to those organizations to receive mostly some magazines you do not even read

Ahhh....the old unions will save the day argument. You obviously have zero understanding of how unions work my friend. Unionized pharmacists would have it no better, and likely worse, than they do now. Here is some light reading for you.... http://articles.chicagotribune.com/...harmacists-association-walgreens-white-collar

The pharmacists--who make more than $90,000 a year--returned to work for reasons ranging from personalfinancial issues to the belief that the union had successfully spread the word about staffing conditions that could compromise patient safety.

"We had some diehard people who wanted to stay out longer," said Chuck Sauer, the union's executive director.

But "we've got people who've got significant mortgages, kids in school, things to tend to," he said. "Pharmacists are no different than many people. Some go paycheck to paycheck and aren't as thrifty as they could be."

Leverage. In order for a union to be successful it has to have some sort of leverage. What leverage would unionized pharmacist bring against a company like Walgreens? Going on strike is a one means to effect change. As you can see from the example above that little tactic didn't work.

 

[oldstock]

Ahhh....the old unions will save the day argument. You obviously have zero understanding of how unions work my friend. Unionized pharmacists would have it no better, and likely worse, than they do now. Here is some light reading for you.... http://articles.chicagotribune.com/...harmacists-association-walgreens-white-collar



Leverage. In order for a union to be successful it has to have some sort of leverage. What leverage would unionized pharmacist bring against a company like Walgreens? Going on strike is a one means to effect change. As you can see from the example above that little tactic didn't work.

Yes sometime you lose a battle or more, as nobody wins all the time. Winning anything takes a lot of work, planning, discipline, and execution... Everything must be done right.... Yes in that example going on strike did not work. But you can always try again...

The point is union gets pharmacist workers to band together and fight for their own interests while paying memberships/dues to pharmacy organizations won't do jack... And nobody fights for anybody in those useless organizations; everyone is just out for themselves...

But let's assume union is not an option. So what would you do or propose pharmacists to do to save jobs and maybe the pharmacy profession then ??

 

[confettiflyer]

I don't want to check cart, or pyxis or that boring crap either, but I would rather do that 25% of the time than being unemployed.

And sometimes it is a nice break.

Every now and then is nice. Under tech-check-tech I still have to audit every now and then.

Key words: "now and then"

 

[MountainPharmD]

But let's assume union is not an option. So what would you do or propose pharmacists to do to save jobs and maybe the pharmacy profession then ??

There is nothing that can be done to save the profession as it currently stands. The only way to save the profession is to reinvent it. Pharmacists must be recognized at the federal level as providers and be paid as such. Pharmacy must switch from a profession centered and dependent on the dispensing of a product to one focused on outcomes management. As long as pharmacy reimbursement is solely tied to the dispensing of a product we are doomed.

Jobs? Nothing anyone can do about that. There simply won't be enough to go around.

 

[oldstock]

There is nothing that can be done to save the profession as it currently stands. The only way to save the profession is to reinvent it. Pharmacists must be recognized at the federal level as providers and be paid as such. Pharmacy must switch from a profession centered and dependent on the dispensing of a product to one focused on outcomes management. As long as pharmacy reimbursement is solely tied to the dispensing of a product we are doomed.

Jobs? Nothing anyone can do about that. There simply won't be enough to go around.

Your view is what I also share but I also doubt pharmacists will able to invent pharmacy without first being/forming a force... This will take a lot of work and dedication from all pharmacists but again I have not seen pharmacists stand united which equates to no force thus no change. Nobody will do the jobs or push for pharmacists' interests but the pharmacists themselves !!

 

[MountainPharmD]

On second thought there is something that can be done. Other than utilization management functions completely remove PBM's from the equation.

 

[oldstock]

On second thought there is something that can be done. Other than utilization management functions completely remove PBM's from the equation.

How would you do that ?? I imagine that would only happen when we have a cash only (or maybe universal healthcare like Canada) system... (But again anything only happens if there is a force...)

 

[ExpressMaiL]

Nothing like catching up on pharm forums in the morning with a nice cup of coffee.

 

[confettiflyer]

Nothing like catching up on pharm forums in the morning with a nice cup of coffee.

I catch up over iced coffee.