Lesson from the Druggie

Dear new pharmacists and pharmacists-to-be,

‘Druggist’ is old-school for ‘pharmacist.’ ‘Druggie’ is simply a controlled substance fiend, usually of the hydrocodone or codeine persuasion. Something I learned as an intern is to be wary when someone calls up and asks you for a particular brand of narcotic. If you’re hurting, it really shouldn’t matter that there’s a ‘WATSON 349’ or ‘M357’ (for Mallinckrodt) imprint on your hydrocodone.

Most of those ‘what do you have in stock’ questions get the canned response, ‘I am not sure what we carry, but it should all be the same.’ Then I try to get off the line as soon as possible. Don’t ever say you have something in stock when you’re not comfortable with filling it. It could be fake, and it takes time and energy to diffuse a bad situation.

A first for me was a call from a guy asking if we had the Actavis brand promethazine with codeine. If you’re not familiar with promethazine with codeine, it is the syrup the rappers commonly refer to as ‘purple stuff’ or ‘lean.’ They mix it with Sprite and sometimes crush some other illicit substances (Ecstasy, Xanax, Vicodin, etc) into it. Then all the music they listen to suddenly becomes chopped and screwed, even if it isn’t.

I glanced over to the shelf and saw another brand of the product. ‘We have another brand. Sorry.’ He hangs up. Typical.

When the workflow eased up a bit, I took a look at the product we had on the shelf. Guess what I saw. Not the characteristic purple of that ‘drank’ but a light pink hue of watered down Kool-Aid.

[a tasteless joke about grape being purple and watermelon being red has been excluded due to political correctness]

His loss. Regardless, I wasn’t about to fill that prescription anyway without calling the doctor.