Overnighters, how to get day crew to understand you are busy?

This forum made possible through the generous support of SDN members, donors, and sponsors. Thank you.
Are you Hospital or Retail? I was hospital 7 on 7 off 10p to 730a...I am now 2nd shift 7 on 7 off. Nothing pisses me off more than first shift rolling in eating breakfast, drinking coffee and chatting for the first 20 minutes on the clock. Meanwhile I've got 30 orders in the que and 2 vanc consults that I'm trying to get done before I leave at 7:30
 
Unless they have worked nights they will never understand. Im hospital and they think that nights are just an easy ride. They dont understand that it is only two of us...not 20 pharmacist like day shift. Still the same amount of patients, still the same amount of requests with a fraction of the available help. Lots of ED patients which equates to us having to do a **** ton of antibiotic consults which take forever. Meanwhile the doorbell is ringing for nurses picking up controlled meds and dropping of home meds (and the patient is on 35 meds and wants to use his own meds) so there is at least one hour sorting that mess out. Also, for some reason nurses are unable to locate anything on earth except their car keys when its time to leave. So you are stuck answering never ending phone calls about "you didnt send this" yes...we sent it. Its probably in your med box.
 
At CVS I would always clear the queue, return the 14 days, fill the robot, put away several totes on truck night, do cycle counts etc. They would still complain that I didn't do enough no matter what. Whenever I went on vacation, the techs say the floaters didn't even finish production and left a mess, didn't fill the robot, didn't touch the day 14s or totes etc. That is the only time I got some slack, then a week or two later they would go back to complaining again.

It's BS that the start of the night shift is always chaos with people in line at drop-off, pickup, drive thru, phones ringing, crap left over in the queue from the day. While at the start of the day shift, they come in with their coffee, dilly dally look at the schedule, text on their phone, chat with the techs etc. They have time to order pizza, eat cake for people's birthday, etc. It's cool for the day shift to leave a mess but overnights must get everything done.
 
Just finished worst overnight of my life. Anyone ever get written up for leaving too much stuff for day crew? I literally couldn't keep up with the load, even stayed a half hour late. :/ rip me
 
If you dont have the data such as order count or phone logs then its a he said she said. Get the numbers and you can tell people to shut up.
 
They can't do anything to you, especially if you work graveyard shift. You're golden. If you are gone, they have to do your shift and hours. So tell them the STFU and work!
 
Charcoales said:
Just finished worst overnight of my life. Anyone ever get written up for leaving too much stuff for day crew? I literally couldn't keep up with the load, even stayed a half hour late. :/ rip me
Click to expand...
they actually wrote you up or are you being sarcastic?
 
PharBeyondDriven said:
What exactly do you do all night? I thought 24 hour stores were extinct.
Click to expand...

This is the kind of ignorance the general public has regarding night shift.
Similar conditions where I work with the ever cut back tech hours and college kids (my favorites, no interns right now) going back to school.

Tasks include script pro maintenance (RTS and filling), State counts (no one other than graveyard RPh even touches these...daytime RPh who we continuously tell to back count who won't), BOH red flag report, trash emptying and vacuuming, putting away truck (no help whatsoever), strong pak, QR cleaning/faxes (PIA), poll day ordering, supply replenishment (yeah still no help with simple stuff), and ready fills (10-12 pages production and verification) ONTOP of ALL of the production and verification that has turned red already (10+ pages alone MANY nights)

Daytime strategy: throw all your problems at night RPh and sweep problems underneath the carpet...and if that doesn't work, you at least know who you can blame for not being accountable for the ridiculous amount of work you can't manage (Poor management skills)
 
PharmDBro2017 said:
Print out the report showing how many you verified and filled and compare your numbers to day shift? Seems like the easiest and most objective way.
Click to expand...

I did a report once and I'm evening shift at a hospital (I really only enter for 5 hours a day out of 10 hour shifts).
Let's just say I did 4x more orders, and more "interventions", than every floor pharmacist, within a shorter amount of time.
 
Last edited:
For my mid-year review, I printed off the number of scripts processed, filled, and dispensed. I also have the hospital admissions log sheet. Of all the pharmacists, I am #2 in scripts processed and filled. I'm #1 in rx's dispensed and number of hospital admissions.

If anyone complains night shift doesn't have enough to do, Imma throw it in their face.
 
This is why I preferred the interpersonal dynamics at 13 or 14 hour stores. You are the only pharmacist and it's up to you and everyone else to clear everything (albeit 2800 vs 3300 as opposed to 4k+) during working hours /s
 
worked overnight for 6 years before the chain shutdown most overnights. As others said it is very common for day crew to dump work on overnighters and complain because they think you do nothing (which is not entirely untrue ). At my old store we had about 5-6 pages of refills to fill and some walk-ins and a lot of downtime so no surprise that it shutdown. They watched cameras to see what i was doing overnight so i would have no excuse if they tried to give me more work. Anyway i got sick of the bs grunt work that the techs should've been doing during the day so i sat down with the pic and the supervisor and discussed a list of duties that we could all agree on and you should also try to get it in writing (otherwise they will just keep adding stuff to the list and it will never end )
just make sure you include a half hour for you to eat your lunch since they can't actually deny you a lunch (esp if youre working overnight)
 
khydroxide said:
worked overnight for 6 years before the chain shutdown most overnights. As others said it is very common for day crew to dump work on overnighters and complain because they think you do nothing (which is not entirely untrue ). At my old store we had about 5-6 pages of refills to fill and some walk-ins and a lot of downtime so no surprise that it shutdown. They watched cameras to see what i was doing overnight so i would have no excuse if they tried to give me more work. Anyway i got sick of the bs grunt work that the techs should've been doing during the day so i sat down with the pic and the supervisor and discussed a list of duties that we could all agree on and you should also try to get it in writing (otherwise they will just keep adding stuff to the list and it will never end )
just make sure you include a half hour for you to eat your lunch since they can't actually deny you a lunch (esp if youre working overnight)
Click to expand...

Well, that's why your store shut down the overnight. The lightest overnights do a minimum of 10 these days.
 
Overnight is quickly going from the best to worst position in retail quickly. Especially since the beginning of this year, they have been pushing readyfills and if the day staff doesn’t want to fill anything during the day they can schedule for 10am the next day. Double the work and not one extra hour of tech help
 
mikejones123 said:
Overnight is quickly going from the best to worst position in retail quickly. Especially since the beginning of this year, they have been pushing readyfills and if the day staff doesn’t want to fill anything during the day they can schedule for 10am the next day. Double the work and not one extra hour of tech help
Click to expand...

They are definately getting their money's worth out of me these days.
 
mikejones123 said:
Overnight is quickly going from the best to worst position in retail quickly. Especially since the beginning of this year, they have been pushing readyfills and if the day staff doesn’t want to fill anything during the day they can schedule for 10am the next day. Double the work and not one extra hour of tech help
Click to expand...

Agreed. When I started 3 years ago my store had 6-7 pages with more tech help and $5 differential. Now there's 12-14 pages with less tech help and $2 differential. The increase in readyfills also increases the amount of day 14s, RTS vials, cells to refill in the robot, trash etc but no one seems to understand.
 
Just lurking on the thread... but I have to say from the patient side I found the recent posts about ready fill interesting. I keep telling CVS to take me off ready fill (Which I never signed up for to begin with), but they haven’t. Is it mandatory for ongoing meds?
 
sunshinefl said:
Just lurking on the thread... but I have to say from the patient side I found the recent posts about ready fill interesting. I keep telling CVS to take me off ready fill (Which I never signed up for to begin with), but they haven’t. Is it mandatory for ongoing meds?
Click to expand...

I find that most technicians do not know how to do so (Profile -> VE -> VA, RD line #) or fail to follow up because of excessive multi tasking.
I also do not know if employees realize that readyfill agreement (yes) is a default setting when creating a profile; I ALWAYS decline when making a profile because more than half of the time, the person is not there to ask (should only be put on readyfill if he/she agrees). Another default setting most just blaze through without changing/thinking about
 
RxVampire said:
I find that most technicians do not know how to do so (Profile -> VE -> VA, RD line #) or fail to follow up because of excessive multi tasking.
I also do not know if employees realize that readyfill agreement (yes) is a default setting when creating a profile; I ALWAYS decline when making a profile because more than half of the time, the person is not there to ask (should only be put on readyfill if he/she agrees). Another default setting most just blaze through without changing/thinking about
Click to expand...

Thank you for the thorough explanation!
 
Our overnight inpatient hospital pharmacists generally have the most interventions every month. A good overnight pharmacist is the best and hard to find.
 
sunshinefl said:
Thank you for the thorough explanation!
Click to expand...

Also at the register, it asks if the patient wants ALL of their meds on readyfill. There are patients who are on 10+ meds so the readyfills pile up quickly. If they only want a specific one or two, then the tech has to deselect the ones they don't want.
 
jjcayce123 said:
Are you Hospital or Retail? I was hospital 7 on 7 off 10p to 730a...I am now 2nd shift 7 on 7 off. Nothing pisses me off more than first shift rolling in eating breakfast, drinking coffee and chatting for the first 20 minutes on the clock. Meanwhile I've got 30 orders in the que and 2 vanc consults that I'm trying to get done before I leave at 7:30
Click to expand...

This is so relatable.
 
mentos said:
While at the start of the day shift, they come in with their coffee, dilly dally look at the schedule, text on their phone, chat with the techs etc.
Click to expand...

Sounds like a good life to me!
 
Back in 2013 the ohio medicaid plans were not eligible for readyfill but now they are allowed to be on readyfill so this has doubled the night shift work.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

Blueberry Tea
New to Walmart pharmacy, how to get better at visual verification?
Replies
1
Views
1K
quickpic007
quickpic007
P
Expanded Role of Team Members. Who are they hiring to do these things? Nurses or Pharmacist or Other? Everyone fighting to show VALUE to get paid.
Replies
0
Views
713
PrincessSnow
P
S
Shout out to my 10-15 year old pharmacy veterans, who are trying to survive
Replies
12
Views
2K
Dred Pirate
Dred Pirate
D
Move to other role for higher pay or stay put due to excellent PTO - what would you do ?
Replies
8
Views
2K
AONLINE
A
I
Career Change to Pharmacy
Replies
9
Views
2K
lord999
lord999
Top