The Angry Pharmacist

 Well I'm not after the title of the blogger who uses that title, but last week I got fed up and decided rather than griping about things I would do something.  I wrote a letter to the State Attorney General in MN about what had gotten me so riled up.

What could possibly remove me from my state of serenity you might be asking?  CVS/Caremark - that's who.  They have instituted a new clause in their insurance that if you sign up for a certain plan that you must use their pharmacy or their mail order services.  Why is this such a big deal - because it is one of the most frustrating things to deal with as a health care giver.  I provide the same services at supposedly the same price and because the insurance company is owned by the pharmacy they use sneaky and underhanded ways to get people to use their pharmacies.  That is not the way insurance really works - even if you have a doctor that you like that is not covered by your plan you are still covered if you want to see them, maybe you pay a little higher copay but it's generally not a big deal.

What is happening with people who have these plans is that their meds now go up in price per month between 10 and 50 (and sometimes more) dollars.  Now if you see your doctor twice a year and your copay goes up 25 dollars each time - not a big deal for most people, but see your doctor 12 times a year for each med that you are on and now you have to come up with some serious cash.

I have had it with this system of health care - as my last post said how on earth did insurance ever get wrapped up in health care?  On top of all this they make the choices on what meds my patients end up on, if they are too expensive, they want cheaper alternatives.  In and of itself I don't have a problem with that, I'm the 1st one to suggest a generic or try to save people some cash, but when it's only due to their deal with some drug company and how big of kick back they get, it's a little different.

So I have an appointment to speak with the Attorney General's office, sort of intimidating, but tonight I did my homework and wrote down everything that I wanted to say.  After my conversation with him, I'm going to put this all out of my mind.  It's the acceptance and letting go that I need to focus on.  I could let this fester and boil because if this hits as hard as it could - it may mean losing a lot of customers and ultimately going out of business and if that were the case it would mean more job losses for a town already reeling from this very problem.

When people who don't work in healthcare get to make all the choice on how the system is run - a pretty crappy system is the result.  It would similar to a bunch of Wall Street floor traders suddenly making the rules for farmers.  Oh wait - that already happened too.  

If the people who actually understand the job they are doing were in charge this country would be doing much better than it is.  I worry about the future and just see everything crashing down as the false front of our strong country gets shattered.  What worries me is that many people are going to be hurt because of greed, ultimately what happens will happen because it needs to.  It will be the end of an era of greed, but on the bright side it will be the start of an era of sanity.

So I'm sorry for the rant, but now I got it out of my system.  I'm not really sure what I've gotten myself into...

I thought I would leave with a little cheap humor and found this picture to try to lighten the mood a bit.

Healthcare reform

I have gone back and forth on this subject in my own head quite a bit in the last few days.  Part of me was waiting for it all to sort out and although I am closer to having some rational thoughts about everything it's still a mind boggling thing for me.

I've read a few articles, looked at people's comments on facebook and talked to customers in my pharmacy about this subject and what is amazing to me is that there are very few individuals who have anything good to say about this new change in policy.  Mainly because the bill itself did absolutely nothing to reform the cost and quality of healthcare.  What it did address was insurance.  To me how insurance ever got involved with health care is a mystery.  I understand car, home, flood, or any type of disaster insurance.   Health and life insurance though have always made me scratch my head.

My head just swims with all the different reasons why our healthcare system is out of control.  Lawsuits, corporate greed, fraud, waste.  Everyone knows that doctors are sued when they make serious errors, but they can also be sued if they miss something.  The system is broken and the insurance system is never going to correct it.  I see 91 year old ladies in nursing homes who are getting cholesterol medications - really?  What a waste of resources, but try and tell their 65 year old son or daughter that you think it should be stopped and you will likely get an earful.  What is the benefit of living so long that someone has to feed you and wipe the drool from your chin?  We all are going to die from something and I for one don't want to have to live the last 5 years of my life having my diapers changed because I can't make it to the bathroom in time.

But I digress - probably another topic for another day in that last paragraph.  The issue is healthcare and politics.  All of what has gone down in the past few weeks has really done some damage to the general mindset of people in this country, it has divided people like nothing before.  If you disagree with someone about this you get a dirty look or a wisecrack.  Why is this?  I wish I could understand it better.  One side wants everyone to be covered, the other says that it's too expensive or that it doesn't go about it in the right way.  The one side thinks that if they come up with a good plan people will vote them back in office and the other side thinks if it opposes the plan they will get voted back.  They use every trick in the book to create a virtual war over the matter and force people to take sides.  Their arguments are all logical and well reasoned, but they make you choose and if you don't there is no other option - just for or against.  It's not so simple though since so much is included in healthcare and it's funding.  The bottom line in all of this is that people are getting the care they need and getting it done for a reasonable price.  Yet I haven't heard that said ONE SINGLE STINKING TIME!  All anyone cares about is whether or not their party is right and that the other one is wrong.

I for one am officially not taking a side.  I will continue to do my pharmacy gig the best I can and help the most people I can in that position.  If this insurance and "healthcare reform" mess all comes crashing down then so be it, then I'll find something else to do where I can help people.

More Crazy Minnesota Weather

It's been an interesting month of March so far - just watching the weather.  We went from cold, to fog, to rain, to no snow, to floods and then back to fog, and now the chance of a major snowstorm in a few days.  I love it, where else could you get such variety.  It officially hit -31 degrees F at my place this winter and by July it might be 100 degrees.  What fun, anyway wanted to share some pictures of what I saw today.

The top picture is the new lake down the road from me, less than a week ago the ground was covered with around 30 inches of snow.  Now it's big ponds.

While I was out snapping a few photos a dark blue cloud came racing in and covered what little sun there was.  This picture doesn't really do it any justice - you could just see it gobbling up the farm places.

By the time I got back to my new lake which has been flooding the road for most of the day (this is a picture of the gravel road if you can't tell) the fog was as white as the inside of a marshmallow.

There is talk about a major snowstorm starting by Friday, but I've heard that all before, for the most part this water should pretty much be gone as it slowly makes it's way to the mighty Minnesota River and as the ground starts to thaw and soak up the water.

As much as this weather has been interesting and fun to watch, I think it's been pretty hard on me this whole spring.  Maybe that's not the entire truth - I think it's more that the weather is mirroring me - the ups and downs, the quick changes.  To most people I probably don't seem all that different, but inside it's all just swirling around.  One minute I'm as peaceful as the big fluffy snowflakes, then a crazy wind blows and gets me all riled up.  The next day, the sun is out as bright and radiant as ever and then the fog comes in and makes my brain feel sluggish.  Part of me has always been this way and I imagine there are many others that would agree.  I've almost always (I can't say never) been able to contain this storm inside and look peaceful on the outside.  Most of the storms fortunately are short lived and blow themselves out quickly.

I do have to say though that in the last 4 years that I've had a lot less days where I have had to act like I wasn't foggy, stormy, cold or hot.  More often than not I am inside and out like those big puffy snowflakes that just look they are having fun falling from the sky.  It just seems like the weather changes happen so suddenly that no weatherman would ever be able to predict them.  That's probably what is bothering more than anything.  I suppose I will just have to learn to enjoy all the changes, just like I enjoy watching the sky change now.

May they rest in peace...

I confirmed my worst fears yesterday - one of my hives is full of dead bees.  They were unusually active when it was really cold and then lately since the weather has been warming up there was much less activity.  So yesterday I pulled off the top for a look.  This first picture you can see some bees with their little bee butts hanging out of the comb.  This is sort of comforting if they had to die this is a sign of starvation and not disease.  They all look healthy - the frames when pulled out one by one almost look like they were frozen in time.  Some walking around others digging deep into empty cells for one last drop of honey and then a bunch of them all clustered in one side.

This next picture also confirms that the numbers of them dwindled and then on one of those last sub-zero nights we had they expired.  The top of the picture is empty cells - the bottom and left side is capped honey.  Generally if things are going well the bees move up and down each frame in a big cluster.  They generate enough heat with their buzzing to thaw the honey and eat it.  This time of year they start laying eggs and the temperature gets up into the 80 degrees to keep the eggs alive.  They usually will start in one area and then bring the honey from another to keep things going.  If their numbers are too low in the rest of the hive and/or it gets too cold they can starve to death very easily, even when food is just 1/2 inch away.

Sort of a grim reminder how close any of us is close to death.  Their fate lies (like ours) largely out of their control, the temperature, how much it rains, disease, how much of their hard earned food some big dumb person decides to take from them largely determines whether they live or die.  In this case there is not likely much that could have been done, I could have tried to feed them crystal sugar in hopes they would have made it, but getting buried by snow drifts two times, lots of cold night and a touch of bee diarrhea all did them in.  It

As soon as the wall of snow surrounding them goes away I will move the hive out and clean out the dead bees and get ready for another try this spring.  I'll keep trying harder to keep those little buggers alive, it makes me sad to see them go and sort of guilty since I'm still enjoying the fruits of their labor.