Several years ago when I worked for one of the national pharmacy chains, management had this great idea that all managers, assistant managers, and key cashiers should be cross-trained to work as a pharmacy technician in the event of an emergency. The store manager came back one morning every week, usually on Wednesdays, to serve her time. She would be in the pharmacy for about 15 minutes before some "emergency" in the front-end of the store would pull her away for the rest of the day.
From my discussions with other pharmacy managers in the area, that happened on a regular basis.
But there was one key cashier who truly enjoyed working in the pharmacy. Whenever she was scheduled out front, she would migrate back to the pharmacy. When she was back in the pharmacy, she was eager to learn. She even got to the point in her training where she was doing the data entry on new prescriptions. She wanted to transfer to the pharmacy department, but couldn't due to "budgetary" issues as well as
intra -store politics.
One afternoon, we had her on the computer entering the prescription information. I was taking a prescription over the phone when I had this idea.
I handed several prescriptions to her. Near the bottom was a prescription that read:
- John Q Public
- Mycoxaphylline 50mg
- #10
- i qdprn
- 2 refills
- John Doe, MD
She typing away and then stops. She has a puzzled look on her face, so I asked her if there was a problem.
She said that she couldn't pull up the medication on one of the orders. So I ask her which one she was having trouble with.
She tells me that it's the one for John Q Public.
So I ask her for the name of the medication that she is having trouble with.
"
Mycoxaphylline"
I tell her that it's a generic name and ask her to say the name again.
"
Mycoxaphylline"
It doesn't register with her. So I walk into one of the bays and toss her a bottle of Viagra.
Then she realized what I had done to her.
Then I ducked to avoid the bottle that was being thrown back at me.
From my discussions with other pharmacy managers in the area, that happened on a regular basis.
But there was one key cashier who truly enjoyed working in the pharmacy. Whenever she was scheduled out front, she would migrate back to the pharmacy. When she was back in the pharmacy, she was eager to learn. She even got to the point in her training where she was doing the data entry on new prescriptions. She wanted to transfer to the pharmacy department, but couldn't due to "budgetary" issues as well as intra -store politics.
One afternoon, we had her on the computer entering the prescription information. I was taking a prescription over the phone when I had this idea.
I handed several prescriptions to her. Near the bottom was a prescription that read:
- John Q Public
- Mycoxaphylline 50mg
- #10
- i qdprn
- 2 refills
- John Doe, MD
She typing away and then stops. She has a puzzled look on her face, so I asked her if there was a problem.She said that she couldn't pull up the medication on one of the orders. So I ask her which one she was having trouble with.
She tells me that it's the one for John Q Public.
So I ask her for the name of the medication that she is having trouble with.
" Mycoxaphylline"
I tell her that it's a generic name and ask her to say the name again.
" Mycoxaphylline"
It doesn't register with her. So I walk into one of the bays and toss her a bottle of Viagra.
Then she realized what I had done to her.
Then I ducked to avoid the bottle that was being thrown back at me.