In my experience most pharmacies work like this. I have picked up meds for my parents, my children, my husband, my grandparents, and no one ever asked for ID. I should clarify that I have always done this at their request. This is from dealing with local pharmacies as well as chain ones.
I'm not saying it's a good thing, but it is not unusual. And of course, there are plenty of times when someone else has to pick up a prescription for you. If you've just had surgery and are sent home with a prescription for pain, someone has to go get it for you. I agree that until you talk to them, you won't be able to prevent this from happening again.
I too have picked up prescriptions for my boss and nobody has ever questioned me, even when the Rx was for Percocet. The thought has flickered across my mind that if I could hack into computers and were criminally minded, I could plant a phoney Rx for Percocet, pick it up and I'd be in la-la land or selling the dope on the street in no time Thank goodness I'm not criminally minded and don't know how to hack !
Last edited by ANOther; 08-19-2007 at 03:56 PM.
Reason: wanted to add a couple of words
I think privacy policies are good practice, but some of them have gotten a little out of hand (in my opinion). When I am ill, I definitely want to be able to send my husband to pick up a prescription for me without a lot of red tape.
I know when I wanted him to pick up a printout of all of my prescriptions for the year (for insurance purposes), they would not allow it because of privacy issues. That being said, I believe they assume that a person would have to know that you have a prescription to pick it up. And how would they know? Why you would have told them of course.
My question would be that if you do not want anyone to be able to pick up your prescription for you, why and how do they know which pharmacy you use, and that you have a prescription there to pick up. If they showed up to the wrong pharmacy or at the right pharmacy when you had no prescrptions ready, that would be a major red flag that the person was up to something funny. However if you want to keep your prescriptions secret and inaccessible to someone, you would simply not tell them when or where you have your medications filled.
I lived in Texas for five years and never had anyone ask me for anything other than a phone number or address when confirming my identity when picking up a prescription.
I agree with Kaplods... how did this relative know what pharmacy you use and that you had something there waiting? If you just happened to casually mention that you needed to run to the pharmacy later to pick something up and that's how they found out, maybe next time don't mention anything? That's the only thing I can think of to do.
Personally, I want for other people to be able to pick up and drop off my prescriptions for me. There are some times when it's more convenient for that person, or I might be unable to, such as if I'm really sick or right after a surgery for pain medication.
If you do tell the pharmacist to put a check ID flag on your prescriptions, maybe you could designate another trusted friend/family member to be added to that list so that in the event of illness or whatever, that person could be sent to get your medications.
I could see your frustrations though, and how convenience for some could be used for fishy business with others...
Another good reason to use your insurance company's online services. I get all my stuff mailed to me. Of course, this doesn't work for immediate things like - needing penicillin when I'm sick - but it does work on monthly prescriptions.
I have always thought it was strange that just anybody could do this. Once I picked up my boyfriends grandmother's drugs from Fred Meyers and they didn't even bat an eye. Seemed a little strange - all you'd really need to do is be close at hand and listen for a name then go over there and ask for it later... hrmmm.
Just curious, what possessed your family member to pick up your perscription in the first place?
I've worked more on the other end -- we had a patient steal a prescription pad once and try to turn in scripts for narcotics (which have a whole seperate form) but she couldn't manage to spell the doctor's name right when she signed it.
shelby- once when I worked at a copy place we had a guy white out a prescription and try to make copies of the "blank" one with the signature. We had to kick him out. people do the craziest things.
Thank goodness I'm not criminally minded and don't know how to hack !
