From a pharmacist: Please be considerate with us and understand we are trying our best during these tough times
With the recent changes to the testing criteria, rollout of the boosters, and the Omicron variant spreading, the last few weeks in the pharmacy has been quite challenging for me and for a lot of colleagues I know. Please be considerate with us as we working the hardest and to our best effort with key points mentioned below:
Please do not get angry if the pharmacy staff states it will take 30-60 minutes to prepare your medication when you drop off a prescription. In addition to checking prescriptions to ensure that your medications that you pick up are safe and effective, please be considerate as we have to balance this with picking up phone calls to answer questions from doctors/nurses/patients, doing COVID-vaccinations, COVID-19 testing, fixing insurance issues, ordering medications, and giving medications to patients. Checking a prescription requires clinical judgement from the pharmacist. Rushing us and pressuring us could be life threatening; messing up a food order is an inconvenience but messing up a medication can be life threatening. Rather than being angry that your medication was late by 10 minutes because the pharmacist detected a dosing error or that the wrong brand was almost dispensed (e.g. generic given instead of a brand name as requested by doctor/patient), appreciate us that we are doing the best for the patient.
Please be judicious when asking us questions either in person or on the phone. Tl;dr: Vaccination appointments are booked online at either the provincial website or the online websites of major pharmacy chains (e.g. Shoppers Drug Mart). Pharmacies are not allowed to sell rapid antigen test kits to individuals, only to businesses/companies registered in Ontario. Only pop-up locations are giving out rapid test kits to individuals, which is not an ideal way"* I understand that this is your first time asking us about "where can you book a booster shot (or some variant), or whether the pharmacy sells rapid test kits but it is stressful and becomes repetitive. These questions are a waste of our time. We don't have the time to go over each hundreds of people every day showing how to book an appointment or sending them booking links for waitlisted people both in person and on the phone or answering the same questions everytime. Pharmacies have stopped picking up phone calls with the expectation that many questions will be related to these repetitive questions on how to book a booster shot or whether they sell rapid test kits and that's a problem if pharmacies miss phone calls related to doctors/emergencies. If you want to make rapid tests accessible, contact your local MPPs explaining why the government isn't making it accessible rather than wasting your time asking the pharmacy if they distribute rapid tests kits when pharmacies are not allowed by the government to distribute it to individuals. Stop wasting our time answering these trivial, repetitive questions on the phone and leave it for more important mattters. Pharmacies only have so much lines to pick up. You don't waste a doctor's time asking questions like this and neither should you waste a pharmacist time as well.
If you are symptomatic stay home! If you came in close contact with someone that tested positive or had a workplace outbreak, stay home and self monitor for symptoms! You don't qualify to get tested here. It's frustrating seeing people with coming in when symptomatic that can spread the virus begging for the pharmacy staff to get tested when only asymptomatic testing is allowed here. Often these people I encounter have zero respect for others. They cough on front store staff as reported by my colleagues. It is common knowledge that throughout this pandemic, they kept saying that symptomatic people need to stay home so to not know this after 22 months means either they are ignorant or have trouble accessing information/news; most likely the former. Not to mention these people lie to get tested or go on long lectures explaining why symptomatic people being tested in pharmacies is a great idea. It's unfair to all other individuals doing their part to limit the spread. All of these puts patients at risk, pharmacy staff at risk, and could potential disrupt the pharmacy if staff become infected with COVID-19 and have to close down due to staff shortages. I have seen more positive test results from patients that lied about why they were getting tested compared to ones that got tested for travel or return to work (non-contact/non outbreak related). This is why you hear stories of pharmacists leaving due to symptomatic testing being introduced in pharmacies. Workplace disruptions in many sectors have been reported in the news; do us a favour and stay home if you are feeling ill.
Be patient with your vaccine appointments: Please be considerate as there are hundreds of other people on the waitlist as well and this is to ensure it is fair to everyone and since we need to know how much doses we are receiving to ensure the right number of appointments are created. As repeated earlier in a post. Take into consideration that the pharmacist may have to juggle between many tasks, that a lot of paperwork has to be entered into the system to ensure that it is safe for you to receive the vaccine. If the pharmacist states that you need to contact your public health unit since you received your vaccines out of the country/province before they can give you your booster shot, appreciate them that they provided this information to you, took the time to explain how to do it, and do not get angry at them.
I understand these times are tough but please appreciate your pharmacist. They helped you a lot during this pandemic; helped vaccinated a lot of you, answering questions, and provided useful information. The next time you visit a pharmacy, please be considerate to your pharmacist. Thank them for their tremendous efforts. Thank them for all the hard work they have done.