Why is pharmacy the only department in the hospital expected to answer the phones?

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Sparda29

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Was working overnight the other day. Tech went up to do their OR pyxis refills and I got a bunch of IV requests. So I figured, might as well make stock narcotic IV bags and other stock bags while I'm in the IV room (about a 1-2 hour task).

We have a phone in the IV room but no computer, so I'm definitely not going to answer the phones.

5 minutes into making IVs, I notice the phone light is blinking red, meaning we are getting calls. And then it continues to blink red, meaning whoever is calling is not giving up or waiting a bit before calling back. I don't give up on the IV tasks though.

About 30 mins after continuing to make IVs and ignoring the phone blinking red, I hear the overhead announcement, "pharmacy answer the phones please". I come out of the IV room to hear banging on the door outside and a furious nursing supervisor asking why I'm not answering the phones all while I'm dressed in the IV room garb.

Apparently, the big emergency was a nurse was calling to verify a newborn erythro and vitamin k orders.

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Was working overnight the other day. Tech went up to do their OR pyxis refills and I got a bunch of IV requests. So I figured, might as well make stock narcotic IV bags and other stock bags while I'm in the IV room (about a 1-2 hour task).

We have a phone in the IV room but no computer, so I'm definitely not going to answer the phones.

5 minutes into making IVs, I notice the phone light is blinking red, meaning we are getting calls. And then it continues to blink red, meaning whoever is calling is not giving up or waiting a bit before calling back. I don't give up on the IV tasks though.

About 30 mins after continuing to make IVs and ignoring the phone blinking red, I hear the overhead announcement, "pharmacy answer the phones please". I come out of the IV room to hear banging on the door outside and a furious nursing supervisor asking why I'm not answering the phones all while I'm dressed in the IV room garb.

Apparently, the big emergency was a nurse was calling to verify a newborn erythro and vitamin k orders.

It's funny you bring this up, because it's a little running joke here at my hospital that no matter what department of the hospital has a problem, they always call the pharmacy because we're the only ones that are expected to answer the phones no matter what. You can call any other department in the entire hospital and they will blow off your call if they feel like it. "They always call pharmacy because they know they will get a person to answer the phone."

The biggest 'emergencies' are not even emergencies at all. We had a nurse frantically calling for PRN simethicone. Well, maybe the patient was having terrible gas and the nurses wanted it to stop at all costs.
 
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I would never leave the phones unattended, especially if you were the only pharmacist working overnight. You could have done that IV task when your tech came back to mend the phones...
 
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I really feel Sparta on this one. Whenever I call one of our facilities the phone rings off the hook and sometimes when they do answer they tell me the nurses are passing meds and can’t come to the phone right now. They also won’t take a message and tell me I just have to call back later.

Meanwhile if we ever told them that the pharmacist are checking orders and can’t come to the phone right now we would probably get chewed out by our bosses lol
 
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I would never leave the phones unattended, especially if you were the only pharmacist working overnight. You could have done that IV task when your tech came back to mend the phones...

IV tasks have to be done. What if the ER/ICU run out of levophed/vaso/vecuronium/fentanyl/midazolam drips? Those are more urgent than phone calls and order verification. If they really need something, they can override the Pyxis.
 
When I worked line, that was a huge pet peeve of mine. I got written up in 2006 as a faculty member called down abusively for a stat order, I made it, and could not get that physician to come down to pick it up (required per protocol). I run upstairs with it, and icily say on tape, "Your stat order is ready, but answer your *#($ing phone if you're going to yell at me to get it done."

A decade later, that faculty member is up for promotion. Easily screwed that up and wrote in "Pick up your protocol stat orders next time without yelling at me." in the T&P denial comments which the committee had a laugh and went with it after the discussion turned to how that person is a piece of work. It's a story that the junior physicians get told now about being polite.
 
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IV tasks have to be done. What if the ER/ICU run out of levophed/vaso/vecuronium/fentanyl/midazolam drips? Those are more urgent than phone calls and order verification. If they really need something, they can override the Pyxis.

But @Sparda29 , they want to hear your voice! The human touch is the most urgent connection! \s

And yes they can, but if they can call you, it's the easier choice as it dumps on you.
 
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IV tasks have to be done. What if the ER/ICU run out of levophed/vaso/vecuronium/fentanyl/midazolam drips? Those are more urgent than phone calls and order verification. If they really need something, they can override the Pyxis.
I'm saying, could they have been done when the tech or another pharmacist was in the pharmacy? Why did you choose to do it when the tech was out?
 
I'm saying, could they have been done when the tech or another pharmacist was in the pharmacy? Why did you choose to do it when the tech was out?

That was the most convenient time for me. I have other tasks to attend to later in the night/early morning where I can't be in the IV room.
 
I really feel Sparta on this one. Whenever I call one of our facilities the phone rings off the hook and sometimes when they do answer they tell me the nurses are passing meds and can’t come to the phone right now. They also won’t take a message and tell me I just have to call back later.

Meanwhile if we ever told them that the pharmacist are checking orders and can’t come to the phone right now we would probably get chewed out by our bosses lol
The nurses in our setting are so needy. A lot of times even speaking to our techs on the phone isn't good enough. Look you don't need to talk to a RPh if you're looking for your med or asking to reorder something... It's crazy even back in my days of CVS I can freely go to the restroom knowing my techs are able to tend the phones while here I get paranoid whenever I'm checking IVs / in the control room / restroom.
 
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I honestly call this hospital's inpatient pharmacy when I get the phone tag runaround / can't reach the hospitalist office at a certain hospital, which is open apparently only from 3 AM to 7 AM.
 
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It sounds like a bad staffing model if the pharmacist has to go into the IV room every night for 30-60 minutes to batch IV stuff while basically leaving the phone, and possibly the order queue?, unattended.

Are techs not allowed to make the narcotic drips at your hospital?
 
I would never leave the phones unattended, especially if you were the only pharmacist working overnight. You could have done that IV task when your tech came back to mend the phones...

you are reinforcing the abuse that pharmacy has to answer phones while other department doesn't hahahhaha

question, if people always feel like the pharmacy department is the "least important" in the hospital, why are they expected to always answer their phones lol
 
It sounds like a bad staffing model if the pharmacist has to go into the IV room every night for 30-60 minutes to batch IV stuff while basically leaving the phone, and possibly the order queue?, unattended.

Are techs not allowed to make the narcotic drips at your hospital?

Well during the weeknights (not weekends) we have 2 overnight Rph. However, the workload doesn't slow down just because it's the weekend but the staffing is much less. We should have a dedicated IV room RPh on all shifts. Day time IV pharmacist is so bogged down with compound IVs lately (remdesivir, oxytocin, azithromycin, all the others I listed, precedex, etc). Then the evening shift on the weekend is only 2 Rph. Definitely understaffed on weekends.

Techs are not allowed to compound anything.

Either way, the nurses here are too needy. They should assume we are busy with something and can't get to the phones. (Note: our department is completely closed off to the hospital there is no window where you can look inside.)
 
Why do doctors get to sleep on their overnight shift and pharmacists don't? If I get a new admit past 10pm and have to call about an error in the med rec, it has to wait until morning cause the doctors are asleep. Must be nice!
 
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you are reinforcing the abuse that pharmacy has to answer phones while other department doesn't hahahhaha

question, if people always feel like the pharmacy department is the "least important" in the hospital, why are they expected to always answer their phones lol

I don't care if other departments don't answer their phones. That's the same mentality some pharmacists have when some do the bare-minimum or slack off so then other people follow along. Yeah sure, I also hate when nurses call for some BS reasons but how can you differentiate the BS calls from actual emergency calls if you aren't going to pick up the phone? Not all drugs are overridable unless the ADM is set to critical override.
 
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New York.

I wouldn’t want techs to be compounding anything anyway. The more things you allow techs to do, the less pharmacists they hire.

Weird. Georgia also has the mandatory compounding exam but we allow techs to compound.

In any case, you may have a point there. But it sounds like it's not really helping your particular situation if you're the only pharmacist only weekend night shifts.
 
I don't care if other departments don't answer their phones. That's the same mentality some pharmacists have when some do the bare-minimum or slack off so then other people follow along. Yeah sure, I also hate when nurses call for some BS reasons but how can you differentiate the BS calls from actual emergency calls if you aren't going to pick up the phone? Not all drugs are overridable unless the ADM is set to critical override.
If it is not set for critical override then it’s not really an emergency.
 
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Weird. Georgia also has the mandatory compounding exam but we allow techs to compound.

In any case, you may have a point there. But it sounds like it's not really helping your particular situation if you're the only pharmacist only weekend night shifts.

Normally it is a chill shift. They haven’t changed the staffing to accommodate for covid though.
 
Not legally, only pharmacists/supervised interns. That includes reconstitution as the board considers that to be the most basic form of compounding.

A friend of mine works in a satellite pharmacy on a floor in one of the big nyc hospitals. Blew my mind when she told me about the activating the antibiotic vials attached to mini bags.
 
A friend of mine works in a satellite pharmacy on a floor in one of the big nyc hospitals. Blew my mind when she told me about the activating the antibiotic vials attached to mini bags.

Don't nurses do that?
 
If it is not set for critical override then it’s not really an emergency.

You don't set pyxis on critical override unless there is a network outage which prevent communication with the EHR. I can't take you seriously when you exposed yourself watching netflix and playing counterstrike during your overnight shifts lol. But hey, you do you.
 
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New York.

I wouldn’t want techs to be compounding anything anyway. The more things you allow techs to do, the less pharmacists they hire.
Any New Yorkers know when this is going into effect this year?
 
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what happened to sparda
 
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