Medication and Pharmacies - A little rant

[Becs]

There are lots of complicated licensing laws regarding drugs of this class so the pharmacist is perfectly within their rights to ask for a prescription. Staying on codeine for a long time is bad news, it's addictive, just like the other drugs in its class (i.e. morphine!). You also shouldn't be taking "cocodamol" and paracetamol together, you'll be overdosing the paracetamol - another reason for the pharmacist to refuse you.

 

[dellzeqq]

dihydracodeine (aka DF118). The Mutts Nuts.

I only take painkillers for infections in my lower jaw (it's a long story), and, if I'm in great pain DF118s are top - but ibuprofen/paracetamol combos aren't bad.

 

[Archie_tect]

It's not profiteering - you're being asked to pay your due. Stop whinging like a spoilt Daily Wail reader...

I'm pleased you are fit and well Reg...

 

[asterix]

Not one for medication, but the last couple of months I've been in a fair bit of pain from a small operation that didn't go quite to plan.

This summer I had to go to a French doctor for the after effects of an operation in 2008, minor but like yours painful and had swelling round one eye.

The doctor checked it out and prescribed antibiotics* which fixed it but on returning to the Uk I had more bother so I went to my doctor here who again prescribed antibiotics which have fixed it. I think it's going to be ok, but I have said I am not satisfied and want to return to the hospital that did the op for them to check it. My doctor has agreed but the hospital is being a bit awkward, perhaps not deliberately just strugging with yet another ideological hurdle imposed from above. Nevertheless, after 3 goes I have an appointment.

My take is that it may be the NHS but I have still paid for it and I am going to get proper treatment and not be fobbed off by whatever system gets in the way.

Recently I went to a health check at my surgery but after 2 goes the nurse wasn't able to get a blood sample so she suggested I get it done at ASDA.. Far canal.

*have put a claim in to the NHS to to get a refund! Yes, you can.

 

[fossyant]

You also shouldn't be taking "cocodamol" and paracetamol together, you'll be overdosing the paracetamol - another reason for the pharmacist to refuse you.

I think most of us are aware of that being 'both' drugs in one and don't take the paracetamol when taking co-codamol. Certainly wouldn't take it for long myself, or indeed repeatedly all day - for me it's for occasional evenings as I really don't like the side effects (feel like my head is fuzzy - that will be the opiates ).

When my shoulder was really bad (last winter - sorted now ) I was having to get co-codamol from one pharmacy, then more from another - as there was only a few days 'supply' as I was taking quite a lot for a while. Thankfully the NHS eventually referred me to a pain specialist and I was treated by a number of trigger point injections - been lucky that no further ones were needed as the muscles and facia settled down immediately.

I can appreciate staff following rules, but we have this one particular 'jobsworth' who spouts all sort of crap. When I complained to the Practice upstairs, they knew exactly who I was talking about.

That reminds me, must pick up my prescription later ! and put it under her nose !

 

[Archie_tect]

Sorry to hear that... You're right about how wonderful the NHS hospital staff are.

 

[lulubel]

It's not profiteering - you're being asked to pay your due. Stop whinging like a spoilt Daily Wail reader...

What rubbish.

When I was in the UK, my doctor refused to prescribe me more than one asthma inhaler at a time, so I had to pay the full prescription charge for each inhaler, which cost the NHS about £2.50. I thought the whole point of the NHS was that it was supposed to provide free (or at least subsidised) medical care, not that chronically ill people are forced to subsidise it because they have no other way to get the medication that's keeping them alive.

Now I'm in Spain, I can buy my inhalers over the counter, and I pay the Euro equivalent of about £2.50 each.

 

[lulubel]

How do you think the NHS is paid for? Pixie dust?

The prescription charge reflects an average cost across a wide range of commonly prescribed drugs. As with any average some drugs will cost less than the prescription cost and some more.

The NHS doesn't make a 'profit' on prescription charges, which was what was being suggested.

You may be able to buy your inhalers over the counter cheaper in Spain - but wait until you need something a little more complicated, and see how the costs quickly add up.

It made a profit on my prescription charges, which was my point.

The problem with the system in the UK is that people like me, on low incomes (but not quite low enough to qualify for free prescriptions) are forced to subsidise the medical costs of others, despite the fact that we already pay tax and NI contributions, which is how the NHS is supposed to be funded.

I had no choice but to pay for those prescriptions because I needed the medication to keep me alive, and because of the NHS and the attitude of my doctor at the time, I was paying about £100 a year for medication rather than the £40 it would have cost me if I'd been able to just buy my inhalers. (When you're struggling to find the money just to buy food, that extra £60 a year is significant.) The alternative, I suppose, would have been to not get my prescriptions, wait until I became too ill to work and qualified for disability, have a free stay in hospital while they got my asthma back under control, then get the prescriptions for free.

Oh, wait! I know plenty of people who play the system like that.

As a UK citizen, I'm entitled to free emergency medical care in Spain, but opted not to use it when I was knocked off my bike earlier this year, and saw my own private doctor instead. (I make an annual payment to see him as many times as I need.) For bigger things, I have private medical insurance. And it all works out a lot cheaper than the system that was screwing me over in the UK.

 

[lulubel]

No you're not. You are not 'subsiding' others - you're being asked to pay your fair share.

Or you could have got a prepayment certificate...

No it doesn't. And you clearly don't understand how public services are funded in the UK or how the taxes you pay are related to those services.

It does work out cheaper. I'm the one spending the money, after all, so I think I know how much I'm spending

Paying out more than is necessary to cover your own needs so that others can benefit is subsidising others. That's how the NHS works. People who don't need expensive medication end up paying for people who do.

I can live with that. What I have a problem with, however, is that the system is set up to be so grossly unfair. My mother-in-law was on disability, so she got free prescriptions. I was working, so I didn't. Her basic disability (not including the extra she received to pay someone to help her around the house) was more than I earned. How is that a fair system?

A prepayment certificate would have cost me even more. It was over £100 at the time - and even if it had benefitted me, how do you think people on low incomes find a random £100 here and there?

I understand perfectly how public services are funded in the UK. They're funded by various forms of tax, which are mostly assessed according to income. That works for me. The more you earn, the more you can afford to put in. However, prescription charges are not fairly assessed according to income.

We're always going to disagree on this because you are clearly one of the financial winners in the UK system and I was one of the losers, so I'm going to bow out of this thread before it degenerates into mud-slinging. I've made my points, you've made yours, and we'll just go round in circles if we carry on.

 

[Hacienda71]

In Brazil (not sure if this is still the case) the doctor will treat you on their form of the NHS but you must provide/fund your own drugs/disposables. When a friend of mine crashed his motorbike over there he had to send his girlfriend down to the local chemist to buy the sutures and painkillers for the doctor so he could be treated.

 

[Smurfy]

Pharmacies and pharmacists (or their assistants) have changed a lot in recent years. It used to be possible to walk in, buy what you wanted, and walk out. Nowadays I'm getting the Spanish inquisition even for over-the-counter stuff, then I end up feeling rude for telling them that my health details are confidential and only for discussion between me and my doctor. Not everyone wants to discuss their healthcare with the half a dozen staff and other customers that are within earshot. Why can't they save their interrogation for people who actually ask for help?

 

[ASC1951]

Why can't they save their interrogation for people who actually ask for help?

Because very occasionally they give the wrong stuff to the wrong person, who then dies, so there is an outcry in the press and Something Must Be Done.
That Something is inevitably more questions and form filling, and people employed to read the extra forms that have been filled in, but it doesn't stop people being given the wrong stuff because it is all done by humans and humans make mistakes.

 

[Becs]

Paying out more than is necessary to cover your own needs so that others can benefit is subsidising others. That's how the NHS works. People who don't need expensive medication end up paying for people who do.

I'm sure you'll appreciate it when you're charged £7.50 for a drug that costs £50+, unless you're lucky enough to never need expensive drugs, in which case you should just be grateful.

 

[vernon]

I'm sure you'll appreciate it when you're charged £7.50 for a drug that costs £50+, unless you're lucky enough to never need expensive drugs, in which case you should just be grateful.

Some folk are never grateful and can't see beyond the end of their nose.