Caremark should be out of business

My experience with Caremark has been unhappy as well. For those who
are skeptical you may want to check out this site:
http://www.consumeraffairs.com/rx/caremark.html and read the stories
of how Caremark continues to stick it to its customers in 2009.

Regards,
D

While some of the things Caremark does are downright ridiculous, in
this case it looks like you were being just as bad, and it seems like
you're being irrational and angry here, so it's hard to take this
particular complaint seriously.

First off, answering phones is not exactly a highly trained position,
but that still leaves no excuse for them to have been rude - it would
have been easy enough for them to put you through to someone.

"My prescriptions had to be re done to show 90 days on the slip and
not a refill for 11 times. She refused to check with the Dr.'s office,
a simple task for a bone lazy staff."

This doesn't make any sense here. You should have been more clear
about what was wrong with the script - did it say "11 refills" on it?
Though an unusual number, there should be no problem with it - or did
it say to dispense 11 disks all at once? That would be an issue. Did
they just forget to write that it was a 90 day supply? For a packaged
medication that's not really an issue as long as quantity and
dose/instructions are included.

As far as calling the doctor, that wasn't her job; they have a
department for making doctor calls, and often times it takes a few
attempts to get through to a doctor, or even to a nurse authorized to
prescribe. They could have beem better about communicating that,
though.

"The doctor's office called all 8 of them in. When I called to have
one refilled, Caremark stated all of them must be filled or the others
would be thrown away, how convient for Caremark and how expensive for
me, I paid $118.00."

If this really happened the way you say it did, then yes, that's bogus
on Caremark's part. I'm gathering these were all new prescriptions
and not refills, so general practice should be to either return the
ones you didn't want filled, or to hold onto them for you until you
did want them filled. This was a bad, and probably incorrect, thing
for them to say.

"When I checked on-line, they show the most important one for Asthma
left off. I called had to wait and was told the Dr. did not include
instructions - it's an inhaler how do you think you use it. Then he
back tracked and said there was no dosage. It comes prepackaged in one
doze only you would think a pharmacisit would know that- where do you
get your pharmacists from Wal-Mart."

You have no idea what you're talking about here. As far as dosage,
there are three different doses of Advair: 100/50, 250/50, and 500/50.
If this was not indicated, then they have no idea whihc one to
dispense. It is even possible to have other dosages indicated if
Flovent is intended, but that would be rare. As far as instructions,
you need to know whether to take one puff a day, one puff twice a day,
two puffs once a day, one puff as needed, or otherwise, though those
would be the most common. The word dose might be used here (though
improperly) as well.

"He could not tell me when Caremark called the Dr.'s office on the
Advair only that the note was dated 1/24. I requested to speak with a
manager that can actually look up the information - I waited and
waited and waited, he had to take my name and number since they could
not find a manager. I was told someone would call back in two hours."

It would be helpful here if you had said when you called back. And
generally the rule for contacting a doctor's office is once a day, and
whomever entered the notes didn't really need to enter a specific
time. It would also be helpful if you had said whether or not the
issue had been taken care of at the time.

The rest of your complaint isn't describing anything but rather seems
to be anly angry attacks, so it's hard to take seriously.

"I called had to wait and was told the Dr. did not include
instructions - it's an inhaler how do you think you use it. Then he
back tracked and said there was no dosage. It comes prepackaged in one
doze only you would think a pharmacisit would know that"

In response:
a) By law the pharmacist is required to call the doctor to clarify the
directions if there is any doubt as to what the Dr. is prescibing -
dosage, directions, quantity, refills... doesn't matter.

b) While you are correct in stating that Advair comes prepackaged,
what you apparently DON'T realize is that Advair, in fact, comes in 3
dosages. If your Dr. left that information off, the pharmacist must
call to confirm, even if it's a med you have been on for years and
years. The doctor could be changing your dosage at any time.

Bottom line:
Pharmacists are not mind-readers. I think the real problem lies with
your Dr.'s ability to write a complete and accurate prescription. In
the future, maybe you should be directing your frustrations
elsewhere.

- A Nationally Certified Pharmacy Technician

This is exactly why the small, independently owned pharmacies exist!
Or are trying to, at any rate! These large chain pharmacies, and
especially the mail order pharmacies, may very well be less expensive,
but good luck finding one where they care at all about you personally,
or where they are at all motivated to go above and beyond for a
customer. My mother is a pharmacy technician in a small independent
pharmacy that was doing very well until a Super Wal-Mart moved in
nearby. At first, they nearly were driven out of business, as
Wal-Mart's superior purchasing power meant they could not win in a
price war. Eventually, however, customers began to filter back, each
with a horror story about lack of personal care and attention, or of
any desire to be helpful that they encountered at the Wal-Mart
pharmacy. Once the pharmacy recovered from that blow, they did really
well again, until the mail order pharmacies reared their ugly heads.
Again, people started "defecting" from the smaller and slightly more
expensive pharmacy where my mom works, and again they slowly filtered
back as people started to realize that sometimes it is better to pay a
little more to get their prescriptions filled correctly the first
time, by someone who knows who they are, and cares enough to do the
job the way it should be done.
In the mail order pharmacies especially, there is a lack of care that
often results in additional health problems for patients when drug
interactions are not checked or prescriptions are filled in the wrong
strength, with expired medications, or with the wrong drug
altogether!
Hopefully if enough people realize that these "big business"
pharmacies are all about bottom line and not at all about the
patient's care, they will go back to the small professional
pharmacies!

I will agree with you that most of your experience was obnoxious.

However, Advair comes in 3 strengths, and a pharmacist cannot dispense
until we know which one to give you and how to tell you to use it.
Most of the time, since it is a long acting inhaler, you use it twice
a day, but, as a tech with a different retail pharmacy, I have seen it
prescribed with alternate directions, like using it only once a day.
They should have verified that as soon as the prescription was
received, but I hope this clarifies what their intentions were.