Black Box warnings suck

The FDA had an advisory panel on acetaminophen today recommend, among other things, putting a black box warning on acetaminophen products in order to reduce deaths from liver failure. While the FDA has a large ranging and difficult job in protecting the health of the American people, I believe that there are places where we can probably draw the line. There are people who die due to liver failure from taking too much acetaminophen, but the problem they are indicating is with prescription combination products such as Vicodin and Percocet. The likelihood of dying from an overdose on one of these medications is probably in favor of death from respiratory arrest or cardiac failure due to the narcotics being abused rather than liver failure from acetaminophen. Yes, it is easy to overdose on the acetaminophen with these products if you are abusing them and not taking them according to the prescribed dosages, but the intentional abuse of the narcotic substances and combining them with other narcotics and/or depressants such as alcohol is a larger issue which is being ignored and skirted by the FDA.

Let us also look at the recommendations given for over the counter acetaminophen products. The recommendation for maximum dose is being changed to 650mg. The common version of extra strength acetaminophen is 500mg. Most people take at least 2 of them, I know that some people just take a handful. While I believe that people

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should have more respect than they do for OTC products and still consider them medication and chemicals that affect changes in the body, I don't think that will occur because of this FDA panel. I also don't think that people will change the way they take acetaminophen after taking it for a lifetime at a higher dosage.

Related articles by Zemanta

• FDA Eyes Acetaminophen's Liver Risk (abcnews.go.com)
• FDA weighs options to reduce painkiller overdoses (ctv.ca)
• FDA Weighs Pulling Nyquil off Shelves to Address Acetaminophen Overdose (druglaw.typepad.com)
• Acetaminophen and Liver Injury: Q and A for Consumers (fda.gov)
• FDA panel looks at acetaminophen drugs (cnn.com)
• FDA considers change to Tylenol dosages (money.cnn.com)

Three Sixes???? 666??? medicine?

Craziness in the pharmacy again. These older african american ladies steped up to the counter the other day and asked for some help.

"Excuse me do you have any other types of the three sixes?"

"No, I've never heard of it, I'm sorry." I reply.

This is where it gets fun...

"You don't know about three sixes medication?"
"Yo daddy knew about three sixes. I want the three sixes with quinine. It'll fix anything."

"I'm sorry we don't have anything like that." I try to say without laughing about 'yo daddy'.

"Oh well, where's your Geritol at?"

Do you want Plan B or Plan C? The morning after pill dilema.

Ok, I'm totally all about women's rights and having access to the morning after pill. I believe that it will stop some unwanted pregnancies. I also believe that I should have no say in what a woman does to her own body. This issue trancends the debate on morals or ethics with the morning after pill.

I just had a lady, not the first one I might add, who came into the pharmacy asking for the morning after pill and said that she had already taken it earlier in the month and wanted to know if she could take it again this month. Ok, let's just take a little more responsibility please! It's $40 for the morning after pill, it just happens to also be $40 for just about every birth control pill, patch, insert... ect. Doesn't it just make logical sense to go on some form of birth control? I guess I just have a problem with people being reckless with their bodies. The morning after pill is not side effect free... it's not tylenol or benadryl! You're playing with hormones here people! See a doctor, go to a clinic, get on the pill!!!
Ok, that's it.

Forged Prescriptions

I'm not really sure why people do it, but they do. Forge your prescription and I get pissed. That's the way it works. It's like you think I'm stupid when you hand me something that isn't real, that's the way I look at it. I've gotten to be really good at spotting forgeries too. I usually laugh just before I call the doctor to confirm I get to call the cops on someone. Why do I laugh? Well, there's lots of reasons....

1. Different color ink
2. Writing over a number doesn't mean I can't see what was already written
3. Messy doesn't mean it's a doctor's handwriting
4. Misspelled drugs are funny when you try to pronounce them
5. Calling in your own prescription and then calling back to "make sure the doctor called"... it's your same voice!!!!
6. It is easier to get the doctor to over prescribe than to forge

Ok, that's about it for now... But I'll be sure to get some more that I like.

Walgreens discrimination?

This is in response to reading comments made in the linked article.Walgreens is being sued for company wide directed discrimination. I feel that people need to be realistic. You get paid to do your job. You don't like your job, quit. You don't like your pay rate, quit. You aren't given a promotion or transfer, quit!

The suit alleges unequal pay, but the pay rates are the same, it's the bonuses that are where the differences are. Mr. Tucker, you say that you aren't doing well because you have a bad store, then make it good. You want a good bonus, then do what has to be done to succeed. There are set standards for what a bonus is paid on. I am a white guy working in a inner city store. I make it my job to have a great store that makes me a bonus, not only because I like the bonus, but because I have pride in the store and my work. Where is your pride?

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How can you say discrimination?

Walgreens has been slapped with a federal lawsuit for discrimination because they have "unjustly" placed African-American employees in under performing urban stores in predominantly African-American neighborhoods.

Just like the Walgreens company, I believe people like to see a reflection of themselves staring back at me when I go to the store. In African-American communities, sorry to say it, people like African-Americans to serve them. In white areas people like white people serving them. On Neptune, people like Neptunians serving them. Walgreens has the highest percentage of minorities I have seen of any retail store and offers service in many languages. Perhaps it was just making good business decisions to have African-American managers and pharmacists in urban stores located in African-American neighborhoods.

While the ideal world would be colorblind, the real one is not. That is a sad fact, however, providing customers with service representatives that represent the population is not discrimination, it is good business. I am glad for civil rights laws, but this is an abuse.

I would believe that in giving communities staff which is representative of the area, we are accepting and acknowledging the differences in culture and attempting to better serve the customer. If you don't feel comfortable with your pharmacist, you will not talk to them. While African-American pharmacists and managers might not be the only way to make a patient visiting a neighborhood Walgreens feel at ease, it is a start. A patient at ease and comfortable with their pharmacist will communicate better and be better served by the expertise of the pharmacist's consultation.

Tuna fish suspension!?!?

Ok, i know this is strange sounding, but I think it is really cool. I just made a tuna fish suspension for dispensing a drug to a cat. I work at a Walgreens and we compound specialty drugs for all different purposes, but this has to be the strangest think I've ever heard of, but it was really cool. Well I guess if a doctor can think of it, we can make it.