She comes into the pharmacy with a diagnosis,prescription and a matter-of-fact highhandedness.Why did this know-it-all come today,of all the days, when I have a good number of clients waiting in line? I am stuck on Third Hand Music's Hellena singing at the background when I notice the large sheet of Web MD she's shaking furiously in my view.
"You gave me the wrong drugs,"she shouts loud enough to convince me money has been poured in her direction to finish my business.I strongly suspect that wannabe pharm tech who tells his clients pharmacists are not doctors.
"Madam,come into my office and we can clarify if ever you came to me before,"patience is always my last resort when that panic button is buzzing wild. She does not budge until I am forced to forego the urge to publicly plaster her with a genital warts diagnosis.Be still, the nobility of the pharmacy practice prevails. Miss X rambles on about how a visit to doctor Google a day after he collected a prescription from my pharmacy proved me wrong. She is not any better but all the more wiser.
"Did you complete the prescription?"
"No,how could when you are poisoning me," Miss X spits out. The psychology bit of my training recognizes an aggrieved patient who needs diffusion, the bomb kind and not the Fick's law kind.
"Google can tell you a lot of things but you have never seen it get a degree in anything,even honorary" I shut off for seconds, which is all I need to drive my point." Let me get this right.You keyed in a few symptoms ,it gave you possible diagnosis and a list of drugs.Did it see you, examine you,talk to you, poke around in your poop or sputum?"
She's dumbfounded,I got her good. Round two, gloves on."Do you think machines can be doctors? That machine cannot discern the difference between atherosclerosis or arteriosclerosis unless it was a spelling error."Doctor Google will confirm I gave you that for this because there is no way this can cure this if there is bacterial resistance characteristic in this sphere of the medical practice."I knew I shut her up, won her over and impressed some of my clientelle. My advise to patients of Doctor Google,consult her like the dictionary.Once you have mastered the language,you only need a dictionary for Scrabble.Google is good for a second opinion,if you know where to look.
