Before I get into any responses, a comment and a question. While the faxed RX confirmations were annoying but manageable, we absolutely despised the recorded phoned-in ones. We were a really busy office, and having to try to track down a chart when the recording only gave the patient's name after all of the parameters was nigh impossible. If they would have given a name and then just requested a call-back, it wouldn't have been quite so bad (plus, we still used written records, so maybe electronic ones eliminate this problem), but most of the time when they came in, the receptionists simply hung up and didn't bother to check the RX at all, allowing it to go through.
Does anybody know if there is any legal requirement for an office to at least attempt to verify the RX? Ethically I feel there should be (especially because you have eight hours to root around for the chart), but I don't know of anything along that line.
Oh, and I felt really sorry for the people on the other end who had to read those things over and over and over. I'd burn out in single day. I couldn't figure out why they didn't just make it recorded and fill in the parameters with other recordings.
Is the company doing it illegally?
Yes, as has already been mentioned. At least if they're from the US. If they're based in a country that does not require verification, I'm not so sure. Some companies can get away with online activities that are illegal in the US (if they are based in foreign countries they can still provide services to US customers), but I think with CLs being medical devices and going through the US mail, they might still be illegal anyway. As I said, though, I'm not sure.
And wearing my glasses is hard since they are an outdated prescription that I can't currently justify updating (since I wear the contacts 99.9% of the time).
That used to be my frame of mind. I hated my glasses (they were ugly) and exclusively used contacts. Once I actually bought a pair of glasses I didn't mind wearing out where people would see me with them on, though, it gave me a lot more flexibility, especially with being able to switch to glasses if my eyes were tired at the end of the day or if a contact ripped. I used to just make myself deal with it, but it's so much nicer being able to just toss on my glasses, not to mention healthier for my eyes. Trust me, you'll really appreciate the flexibility glasses give you once you find a pair you like, and you can save money by keeping the frame and only changing the lenses if you change RX.
I'd always write on the fax that this Rx was EXPIRED in HUGE letter and fax it back. the patients never called back to complain about it.. so i KNOW they were still getting the contacts.
It's certainly possible some of this occurred when we wrote "expired" and faxed them back, but the vast majority of the time the patient would call us within a day or two saying they needed an exam. Actually, it was standard practice at our office to call the patients and tell them why we were denying the refill before faxing in the form so we could explain it to them, and usually get them to schedule an exam, rather than let them just get a rejection email without any explanation from the online company. Being proactive and giving reasons resulted in much happier patients. (You could always look at it as they're trying to go behind your back in ordering the CLs so you should go behind their back in denying the request, but that kind of thinking is simply corrosive to the doctor-patient relationship, not to mention any kind of relationship in general.)
1 800 contacts has already admitted that they're filling scrips illegally (expired rx's) but no one seems to be doing anything about it.
1-800-CONTACTS is definitely illegal, and yet, for some unknown reason they are pulling it off?
Do you have any reliable sources for this? Like I mentioned above, most if not all of the time they seemed to deny the order if we sent it back to them expired.
Because of this, the docs I knew refused to release a script to an 800 service, which irritated the operators to no end.
AFAIK, unless there is a valid reason to not fill a prescription (expired, medical problem), the Fairness to Contact Lens Consumers Act (
http://www.ftc.gov/opa/2004/06/contactlens.sht) requires the RX to be released, and therefore the doctors' actions were illegal. I think we had a few questions about signing off on a patient requesting something like two years worth of contacts a few days before his/her RX expired, but that had more to do with a supposed general optometric law/ethic rather than discrimination by our office against online sellers. Basically, you're supposed to treat all outside RX requests the same as if a patient came into your office wanting to fill the same order, even those wonderful "completely final last refill, absolutely no more 'final' refills until an exam, even if you fly Air Force One and are legally blind without your CLs" patients.
