Home Forums Discussions General Discussion Caremark

OK, I am finished dealing with CVS Caremark. I have repeatedly asked them to send refill requests electronically and they continue to fax them. When I ask them to send them electronically, they send letters to the patients that I have denied the refill!!!!! I have explained to the patients that this is a Federal Mandate and that, if I and all other pharmacies have to communicate electronically then Caremark needs to also. I just got off the phone with them and they said "They can receive scripts electronically but they cannot yet initiate refill requests electronically but they are working on it". I explained to them that they are the only mail order pharmacy and the only pharmacy period that I deal with that cannot do this. All the little podunk pharmacies here in Podunk, Indiana can do it so there is no acceptable explanation why Caremark cannot.
I advised them that physicians are tired of being made the "bad guy" and the last thing they should want is a nation full of po'd doctors refusing to refill scripts. Personally, I refuse to deal with them anymore. I will not refill faxed requests. My patients are going to have to get involved. Anyone else out there care to join me in this movement?

Still ticked off even after venting.

I have had problems with the entire CVS Caremark organization, top to bottom. Their local pharmacies are just as bad with refills. They regularly "run out of" common medications. And two of the CVS pharmacies in this area are under investigation by DEA for being the top two dispensing stores for oxycodone in the entire country!

Sounds like 60 Minutes should do an investigation.

Same here in Findlay. I am asking all patients to come and get the fax forms from caremark and send them in themselves and all rx's that I can transfer or change to a 4/10 dollar list is being done. Lets start a boycott caremark....we could place a website stating same in about 20 minutes...

Ijust had a CVS tell my patient that they did not receive their Rx. It was sent yesterday. The system says that it was ultimately faxed to them. But they claim that they did not receive it in any form.

I am for a boycott!! It is time that we as physicians stand up not only for our rights but for the rights of our patients.

I convinced the patient to go to Duane Reade and I sent it there. That was a couple hours ago, so I guess she's ok now.

I am ready to jump on the anti-cvs/caremark bandwagon, especially with a gal who champions Lys...ata, (too many letters to remember for one who couldn't make it into vet school so decided on med school instead) I am sick and tired of having to fax the meds, and now their new technique is after faxing in the meds, CVS/caremark now has me resend their own typed up faxed document and refill everything out again--its rather like going to a fancy restaurant, and having to deal with a waiter/waitress with attitude--forgetting their role is to serve you and not the other way around. Poor service, I will go elsewhere for my business and if a patient wants to stick with CVS/caremark then they get a printed script they can send on their own. jimmie

Sounds great, Jimmie. I too thought about vet school but decided I could stand to watch animals suffer. People?....well... I am going to do like you. If they have Caremark, they will have to send it in themselves along with the understanding that when Caremark faxes another request to me for the same script so that it is on their form, I will not comply. We definitely need to get the patients involved. We as physicians have allowed this abuse of us for way to long.

Leslie what zip code is Podunk, Indiana? hahahaha

We have some remote locations in Maine too.
Towns from far away in Maine include: China, Norway, Sweden, Paris, Denmark, Naples, Poland, Mexico, and Peru. These are actual towns in Maine.

We have a bunch of unnamed territories too. T-R numbering system. T4-R11 for example is in Baxter State Park, the largest state park in Maine.

The favored fictitious "far away" town is not Podunk, Maine. Rather we refer to it both as East-Gish or East-Bum-[censored]. Why the "east" always gets thrown in there is not well understood by me.

Since I'm hijacking this thread, a dozen cool facts about Maine:
1) Maine supplies over 90% of the U.S.A's lobster supply.
2) Maine supplies 99% of the nations blueberry supply.
3) the paper industry has declined radically in the past 10 years and is almost non-existent.
4) tourism is still the leading industry
5) the suffix "-er" and "-ar" and pronounced "-ah"
i.e. lobstah=lobster, cah (pronounded caaaaa) =car, and ayah=yes (don't ask me to explain that one)
6) Maine has three parts: DownEast, UpNorth, and the Flatlanders (or Flatlandahs)
7) Maine is the oldest state by percentage aging population. It's also one of the top smoking, high alcholic, and nearly fattest states in the union as well.
8) Maine is the 23 rd state to join the union, formally part of Massachusetts, and came about as part of the Missouri Compromise signed into law March 1820 allowing Missouri into the union as a slave state, Maine kept the slave/free state's numbers equal.
9) As a result of Massachusetts people still feeling like they own Maine, and drive our country roads with the inner city Boston attitude, true Mainahs kindly refer to our Massachusetts brethren as "Massholes."
10) Maine's license plate motto is "Vacationland" however a bill was narrowly defeated recently that would have changed in to read "Taxationland" since Maine's state taxes are in the top five for the nation (no surprise, Maine has been largely Democratic for the past 50 years.).......ok I made up the part about the bill being defeated. There was no bill, but I think the license plate motto would be a more accurate reflection of the state of affairs here.
11) the whoopie pie is the State Treat, the Blueberry pie the State Dessert, the white pine is State Tree, the white pine cone and tassel is state flower, and the chickadee is state bird, and the state flag depicts a farmer, a seaman, a white pine tree, a moose, a field, and ocean, and it says "Dirigo" which means "I lead" and finally the north star is on the flag. Maybe this is why the saying "as maine goes, so goes the nation."
12) Finally if you are ever in Maine and asking for directions to some place, don't be surprised if the response is simply "You can't get there from here." But the true Mainahs say it "Ye caaaaaaan't git theyah from heyah."

Podunk's zip code is BR549.
Regions in Indiana are referred to as: Indy, East Chicago,Northern corn region, Central corn region, Southern corn region and Kentuckiana (which is in the Southern corn region) where I am. We always have to know what time someone is on..."Indiana time or regular Time". More streets are named "Bobby Knight Ave." than "Elm" or "Maple".
No one really knows why we are the Hoosier state but most speculate it was derived from the common question "Hoosier Daddy?".

I'm originally from the Washington DC suburbs. We always used West Hell as the fictitious, out of the way town.

Now, for someone who, instead of taking the direct route, took some long, out of the way, round-about route to someplace, my father used to say they "went around Robin-Hood's Barn" just to get next door.

Spending my first 15 years of life in Indiana--I had a vague sense that time changed elsewhere in the country as the national news would change time--not us. The Blackfeet here in Montana say- leave it to the white man to cut a foot off one end of the blanket and sew it to the other end of the blanket and think you have a longer blanket. I have to agree, the whole concept of daylight savings has never made sense to me and to think that we can legislate controlling time is the same in my mind as legislating health care from a priveledge to a right. The insanity and egotistical notion of trying to change the unchangeable is quite amusing in my mind. Time doesn't change and health care will never be a right, unless we all become as inanimate as the instrument I am sitting in front of.
Oh by the way Leslie I think I had one success with CVS/caremark to zip 60056--I believe it went through, if no hang ups I will let you know--
Also, I was taught in school that the term Hoosier came about by the regional dialect when answering the door the locals would ask "who's there" which sounded like Hoosier. jimmie

Jimmie,
As a fellow Hoosier, I hope you knew that much of what I said was my usual sarcastic drivel. Indiana is actually more progressive than most would think. It is one of the best states in which to practice medicine.

Leslie,
I should be the one apologizing--hijacking your thread with my moments of insanity--to relate daylight savings time and the Obama health care act is a bit strange to say the least, and I love my memories and times in Indiana--and I was falling off my seat when I read whose your daddy--
I get these fleeting thoughts that just come out, and probably better if I worked them out in my head before bludgeoning folks on the thread here--sorry--jimmie

Now in Illinois it's completely different. I don't know of another state that had it's travel slogan "Just outside of Chicago is a place called Illinois."

Leslie is correct about East Chicago/Gary/NW Indiana being a distinct region of Indiana. It is a suburb (in the loose sense) of Chicago. We should have annexed it so then it could have higher taxes. Once you leave Chicago you are in corn belt for the next 200 miles in almost any direction except north (OK Cheese heads, I know you also grow some corn, but you do have variety)

What does this have to do with Caremark????

@Jimmie...No apologies needed!!! I agreed 100% with you. I was just afraid you would think all those things I was saying about your home state were true

@Wendell...HAHAHAHA. At least those of us in Southern Indiana know that Gary is a suburb of Chicago. Most of the Hoosiers in Northern Indiana don't even know that the Ohio River forms the boundary in the south, not to mention that Louisville is a suburb of New Albany, IN.

Wendell,

I will try to explain how my loosely associated remark above pertains to caremark/cvs. Being mandated to eprescribe by the Federal Health care act, is similar as being mandated to change one's clocks twice yearly--as they are both legislative acts (I believe)and in my opinion two legislative acts that are attempting to change entities (not sure if this is the appropriate term) that are not possible to change (in my opinion)-- time itself and the human will. I understand the logic and reasoning for the time change when it occured as the US was more agragarian and was done to make it more feasible to get the crops in (as I understand it in a simplistic fashion)-however the issue for me has more to do with control than reason, especially the Federal mandate of Obama care. I really sympathize with Leslie's frustration, as we are being mandated to eprescribe, and when we comply and "bend our will" to be good citizens, we are the ones to suffer the penalty when unable to achieve the necessary percentage because the CVS/Caremark won't allow us to.
However the basic legislation of Obama care I think pits the will of the Doctor against the will of the patient. Therefore insinuates a third party into the mix, and thus the death of the patient doctor relationship.
I find myself more concerned and worried about meeting all these esoteric goals (pardon the cynicism)than actual patient care.
I think most if not all physicians are a caring bunch and try to make the world a better place, and know where our bread is buttered, and that our allegiance is and will always be to the patient first.
When the essence of my will, as a physician, is in conflict, I will always choose my patient first or I will have to find another profession.
Thus I am all for Leslie carrying on the torch -- I have also decided if a patient wants to continue with CVS/caremark with the Az zip, the one that doesn't play ball, then the patient will get a printed script to get their script (with an explanation why). I agree, I think we have to get the patient involved in the fight.
jimmie

I prescribe to Caremark electronically all the time - search for Caremark and then go down to the one marked CAREMARK MAIL ORDER ELECTRONIC and hit send. Unless I missed something on the post that is the one using caremark for mail order scrips and I have no problem getting it to work.

Hello SOuth Bend...from a former Seattle native.....watch your Caremark rx's as some time they mysteriously dont get them and little old ladies become extremely vocal about not getting a little pill on-time....dealing with Caremark on the phone as a doc is a complete disaster....I am sending as much business away from them that I can....it takes them 24 hours to have your rx in the system once you send it. At medco it take 5 min at best....todd

I know it is atrocious - I believe caremark is the one that sends me faxes with no phone number on them only fax number. Frustrates me to no end - I will just send it over and over and tell the pt. what day and time surescrips verified it and they tend to get mad at Caremark. I do my best to generate ill will against all mail order as I feel it destroys the pharmacist-patient relationship.

Leslie,
The next 10 years after Indiana was spent in West Virginia, at least in Indiana we could make fun of the Kentuckians, in West by God Virginia, where my mother's clan hailed from, I found out what it was to be the butt of the jokes. So I had to relocate to Montana where the men are men and the sheep are afraid and degraded the gene pool further, which I successfully did by marrying a german-norwegian dry land wheat farmer gal (me not her), who gave me two lovely ingrates. So this has nothing to do with caremark, but I didn't get a chance to respond to you earlier. So it goes... jimmie

And the Montana men love their Rocky Mountain Oysters and the festivals that go along with them

I think one of the better known is the Testicle Festival, although I have never attended. This has nothing to do with the Testicle Festival, but for a little Montana humor you might want to you tube the Ringling 5 and listen to the little diddy "if Jesus was a Norwegian"--I'll warn you the songs are not politically correct, and those feint of heart may be offended.
jimmie

I love this board!

Leslie,
Just wondering if you had a chance to see the Ringling 5 yet. jimmie

Typical for this board...what starts as a perfectly good, cathartic, angry rant rapidly progresses to a call for a television expose, a discussion of healthcare reform, and a boycott. Two days later it is all about testicles, testicle festivals and funny, pudgy cowboy singers who can't count. Can't you folks maintain your anger and hostility, even for a week? What kind of protest is this?

.... and I stop by just so that I can laugh long and hard for a few minutes. SRSLY.

life is too short to stay angry. One can rant anytime.

Besides, any excuse to get sophomoric humor is valid. We only pretend to be grownup sometimes.

I relented and had a two patients on Friday request scripts to the Shea Boulevard electronic hub of caremark/CVS and both went through. Now I will have to see if I get a fax to redo the scripts or if they end up getting their meds--I will keep you all updated--jimmie