No Escape

CP: Do offices even read the communications we send them? 

CPP: Is Metformin pleasant to the nose? 

CP: It was rhetorical. 

CPP: I know. 

CP: But based on some of the responses we receive, I'm not sure their faxy lackey reads below the header "Pharmacy Request". 

CPP: What was your most recent? 

CP: Everyone has received the "refill approved x42" on a "prior auth required" fax, right?

CPP: Yes. Most of the comments on posts such as this will reiterate the salience of this. 

CP: Right. Today's example is my other, most-hated reply. 

CPP: Not. Our. Patient?

CP: Close. 

CPP: No longer taking? 

CP: Almost. 

CPP: What, then?
CP: "NOT ON HIS MED LIST". 

CPP: Well that's not so bad. 

CP: He's a diabetic and it was for his syringes. To administer his insulin. The insulin they prescribed him. The insulin that IS on his med list. You need syringes to make the insulin go; like gas for your car. It would be like the car dealer selling you a new car but not giving you gas to get off the lot. 

CPP: After the car lot closed. 

CP: On a Friday night. 

CPP: Of a holiday weekend. 

CP: Seriously though. How do you not have "Insulin Syringes" on a patient's med list? Maybe if this were a hospital intake form, I could excuse it. This was a refill request from the primary care provider who wrote the prescriptions for insulin AND syringes. 

CPP: Well it is a "MED" list. 

CP: Don't you start. They go hand-in-hand like peas and carrots, Forrest and Jenny, Jack and Coke.

CPP: At least you could sell the syringes without a prescription. 

CP: Not to a Medicaid or Medicare patient who doesn't ever pay for their supplies. 

CPP: So basically it's a waste of time. 

CP: Maybe if the Giant Deuce hadn't ruined it for all of us by inundating offices with multiple, unnecessary refill requests, the offices may respond a little better; maybe by even reading the fax first. 

CPP: I doubt it. 

CP: I guess we just fax it back, call the patient, tell them their provider thinks they don't need it, and the issue settle itself. 

CPP: Except the posts for the next two days show how lazy and helpless patients are. 

CP: Just let me have this one.