So, I wonder which junkie stole her pills. Maybe one who worked for CVS? You think?

CVS once tried to tell me that 30 pills was enough for 30 days, even though the instructions were "take three every day."

"I'm sorry, your insurance won't cover a 90-day supply"

Buncha rocket scientists.

Because, as we all know, one store's behavior is indicitive of the entire chain.

BTW, klonopin is an anti-convulsant? Really? I coulda sworn it was an anti-depressant.

Now now now, it's obvious what's happening here.

The pharmacy workers are keeping the pills to take for themselves!

Maybe that explains why they can't unlock the cabinet.

I'm gonna go ahead and blame the victim here. (Someone has to) Had Shannon not needed the pills than this would be an issue.

I get sick and tired of reading articles on this website where the person has some ailment that their "qualified" doctor (you know after 4 years of med school just about anyone can call them selves a doctor) perscribed them a medication. Well did Shannon get a second and third opinion? I think not.

CVS and the Insurance Company are only looking out for Shannon's best interest here, I applaud that.

/sarcasm

Yeah, Klonopin is an anti-convulsant. People with seizures take it, not just people afraid of flying.

Not blaming the victim here ;), however, since I was a child my mother always told me to count your pills before you leave the pharmacy. Just like counting your money at the bank. Once you leave, you can't prove anything, and there are less than reputable pharmacists out there. You know, the ones who give you placebos instead of your chemotherapy medication...

@esd2020: or people who have panic attacks.

I think it's important to avoid maligning the entire chain because of a bad pharmacy crew at this location. Of course, corporate is responsible for hiring, training, and keeping tabs on their pharmacists, but keep in mind that not all CVSes are like this.

Our CVS treats us like people, and with a diabetic and another family member with a variety of prescriptions, they have never been anything but professional, and do know us personally enough to understand our needs and to be flexible.

@BuddyGuyMontag: Actually Walgreens treated my father like some sort of pill stealing old man because he counted out one of his regular prescriptions and found the bottle 5 pills short. They thought he was bullshitting them when he went back to the store to ask for what he had paid. Now he goes to a different pharmacy, but counts his pills before he leaves.

I rarely get any pills filled, but also dump out all the pills on a bag/paper over the counter and count them before leaving the store.

@Wormfather: Obvious troll is obvious.

@BuddyGuyMontag: CVS being incapable of checking their inventory? That sounds like a system-wide problem to me. How the hell can you run a nationwide pharmacy and not have a system to check inventory? I doubt the local pharmacist has that problem...

@BuddyGuyMontag: It's not the first time we've read what a bunch of douchebags work at CVS. Once you start adding up all the negative stories it becomes clear they are to be avoided.

It's much worse for them to take this position than to potentially enable addicts, because good customer service matters more than the public health.

Ya I get my Diabetes supplies from CVS and I just hate how it takes them 40 minutes to pull diabetes test strips from the behind the shelf.

@mindshadow: I dont think I was trolling, I was going ahead and doing what someone was going to do eventually, except I was being sarcastic. Only a troll would blame the victim here...oh wait, shit.

@Wormfather: Shit, I turned off my sarcasm meter and missed your /sarcasm at the end of your post. My apologies.

Well according to Wikipedia there isn't a huge black market for this kind of drug. However it is labeled as a high potency benzodiazepine. Thus there are physical dependency issues that can arise if you take it for a long time. There's even an entire withdrawal syndrome named after them. She is correct that due to the withdrawal symptoms it's very dangerous to stop taking these.

But again this seems odd. If you get a perscription don't you check how much is in there when you buy it?

@Bizdady: To be fair, it's not just pulling the test strips. They have to deal with insurance, log the order, etc, as well as do all that for all the people ahead of you.

CVS is full of idiots. They filled a prescription with the wrong drug for me not long ago. Granted, it was in the same class (thankfully), but my doctor didn't want me on that, which is why he prescribed something else. I didn't even get a 'sorry' out of CVS, all I got was a refund and a fake promise to investigate. bastards. No worries, I enjoy the drive to another pharmacy now.

The sad part, when I went back the next day, they still had the original script. I pointed to it and said "Where do you get Y from X?". I got a blank stare. Robots are fun.

Is it so hard to take responsibility and say 'sorry' these days? I'm an easy going fellow, I'll accept a sorry and be on my way, litigation is for the birds.

This is the first time I have ever seen Klonopin described as an "anticonvulsant." It is a widely used anti-anxiety med -- same family as Xanax, but longer-acting. (More like Xanax XR.) Most pharmacies will be way more vigilant about refills on controlled substances. Not to excuse CVS's screwup.

@ADismalScience: It's not just good customer service, it's GIVING HER THE MEDICINE SHE NEEDS TO NOT HAVE CONVULSIONS, which is, I think, in the interest of public health. You're an idiot.

My girlfriend works for a social services agency in Northern NJ and she is constantly complaining about CVS. She works with clients with mental illness but that are stable enough for independent living. They have their prescriptions filled out at a local CVS because it is within walking distance from the majority of the houses they live at.

About a week ago she filled a prescription for a client and was told that it would be 'taken care of right away' A week later the script still hasn't been filled because they claim that the medications are 'Hard to get in stock'. We are talking about a prescription for Cymbalta and other anti-depression and anti-anxiety drugs that this client needs to NOT have a psychotic break.

They filled out one of the prescriptions but they are stonewalling her on the others. Every time she goes there they say that they aren't allowed to talk to her(even though the client has signed a release waiver with both the agency she works for AND CVS) and she can't talk to a manager.

I made the suggestion that she should tell her higher ups and get them to change to a different pharmacy, but they have an account with CVS so I doubt that will happen. Me? I get my prescriptions filled at a local grocery store or at the Wal-Mart that I work at.(And before I get lambasted for working for Wal-Mart, I work in their Tire Lube Express department changing oil and working on tires.)

This happened at a local CVS in Bergen County.
My 13 year old daughter has ADD I filled a script for 60 Focaline XR I actually looked in the bottle to make sure and it seemed right. After a few days my daughter said she believed the capsules were empty. I ignored her until finally she shook one by my ear and I opened and guess what it was empty. I went straight down to the pharmacy and they gave me a new script no questions asked.STRANGE

@Munsoned: They were afraid to be proved in the wrong and/or didn't want it revealed that their employees were stealing some drugs which might be uncovered if they actually did an audit of their inventory.

I constantly read posts on this site claiming that Pharmacists are idiots. Going through Pharmacy school is very hard and takes a lot of work. Sure, there are exceptions, but it's ridiculous having to read these generalizations made by uninformed punks about a serious profession.

To me, this news story from a while back just says it all about CVS -

[www.plannedparenthood.org]

If they don't 'believe' in your prescription, they can refuse to fill it, company policy.

@ediebeale: should not have called ADismalScience an idiot. It's simply an idiotic statement that an issue with a pharmacy and pill count is just a customer service issue. It's also a health issue, and an insurance issue, for that matter.

@ADismalScience: Are you seriously advocating that refusing to acknowledge potential mistakes made by pharmacy employees is a good approach to take because otherwise you would be encouraging addicts to rip off pharmacies? Seriously?

@BuddyGuyMontag: Klonopin is a one-size-fits-all la-la pill. It is related to Valium, but much more potent. It calms you, it takes away the shakes, it prevents seizures (sometimes), it has mild antidepressant properties, and can help you sleep. Klonopin'll also make you feel hung-over, sleepy, and forgetful. It's quite addictive, one usually needs increasing doses if taken for a long period of time, and withdrawal symptoms happen when it's stopped. It's quite the scary pill IMO.

But again this seems odd. If you get a perscription don't you check how much is in there when you buy it?

@satoru: Um, no. I've never checked the number of pills in a prescription I bought at a pharmacy. I'll admit stories like this prove that I should but it never occurred to me to do it before. I've never had this problem.

Of course now I get them through the mail so I can't check the amount in front of them anyway.

@BuddyGuyMontag:
From Dr. WebMD, Klonopin (a.k.a. clonazepam) is used to treat the following:
"Panic Disorder, Epilepsy of the Lennox Gastaut Syndrome, Seizure with Loss of Normal Tone or Strength, Seizures with Irregular Muscle Contractions, Petit Mal Seizures, Manic Bipolar Disorder Adjunct Treatment, Tourette's, Tonic-Clonic Epilepsy, Simple Partial Seizures, Convulsive Seizures, Epileptic Seizure."
You're confusing it with Alprazolam, which is Xanax.
UrbanDictionary claims that it's used recreationally, under the street name of K-pin, but only in combination with other drugs. Your mileage may vary on that one.
It's a DEA Schedule IV controlled substance, which, while it's hardly a schedule I, means that CVS employees ought to be bending over backwards to make sure that their inventories match what they claim they dispensed.

Can't inventory how many pills they have? How do they keep employees from stealing them if they don't? Cuts the customers prescription by 2/3s but gets the insurance to pay for the full amount? Maybe the DEA, IRS and local attorney general should have a chat with them.

@nico002: Pharmacist != the person who necessarily dispenses your pills. Generally there will be one "pharmacist" on duty and a whole bunch of near-minimum wage "pharmacy techs" who have not, in fact, gone to college to learn their trade and may only have had specialized courses in surliness and poor customer service. Especially at CVS.

@satoru: No I never checked my prescriptions and I never knew anybody who did. This seems to be a modern problem. I would have felt like a fool had I dumped my bottle onto the pharmacy counter and started counting pills like pennies, and I have no doubt that it would have annoyed the pharmacist(s) too. I can remember only one time, a long time ago, when I was shorted on a prescription, and the pharmacy fixed it without a peep. Another time, Wal-Mart filled a prescription with the wrong dosage, then didn't want to correct it, but a couple phone calls to the board of pharmacy and to WM HDQ got me an apology, a free prescription, and a full refund.

@SoCalGNX: They inventory their drugs; this pharmacist didn't want to be bothered. Many of the Consumerist stories are about somebody who needed some service that would have required an extra few steps from an employee, but were refused, saying "it's impossible." What they really meant to say was, "Idonwanna."

@ADismalScience: I can't stop laughing. @Beerad: Please get a dry sense of humor. And remember, it's a dismal science.

I always knew that I should count my pills (when prescribed) of narcotic substances but I never thought I would actually hear of a story where they were miscounted. Sounds like a tech with a drug problem probably took some. CVS seems to be the Wal-mart of drugstores or something.

As a person who takes Klonopin for panic attacks, I find this, well, panic inducing. If I stop taking my meds, the withdrawl symptom will put me in the hospital. Luckily, I always check my meds before I leave the pharmacy.

The exact same thing happened to me at CVS in Buffalo last month. I went to pick up my prescription and opened it in my car. I only had 20 pills instead of 120. When I went inside, the Pharmacy manager laughed and said "oops, they must have been counting when the phone rang, and forgot to add the other 100 pills". Yeah, that's not real comforting for a place that is in charge of my prescriptions. Im letting the script run out and going to another pharmacy.

Klonopin is not an anti depressant to my knowledge...it is sometimes used for ppl with various mental health probs, or for pain, or (like the lady in this story) to prevent seizures.

Pharmacists are not idiots. It's just that my Walgreen's doesn't always have a pharmacist there....which i thought is illegal...

It's the other people at Walgreen's and CVS that are idiots.

BuddyGuyMontag: That's exactly the problem with a chain! Their policies are decided upon "from on high", and the individual stores employees have little discretion to make their own decisions, and you wouldn't want them to, either, because they hire minimally skilled people since all they're supposed to do is follow orders.

@clementine: A similar case in Illinois happened a few years back. The state now requires the pharmacy to conspicuously post a sign stating that state law requires the pharmacy to fill your prescription, even if it is for contraceptives.

Previously, if the pharmacist had a moral issue with a prescription, he/she could refuse to fill but would refer the patient to another pharmacist or pharmacy.