# Have any woman here had problems with pharmacists filling the Pill Prescription.



## Kathleen M. (Nov 16, 1999)

Maybe I'm just being overly worried.But I might need to go on the pill to contol my periods because of perimenopause and I don't know if the prescription iron will get me over the anemia.I keep hearing all these reports of all these pharmacists who will NOT fill birth control pill prescription and won't even tell you who will.I don't know how common this is (the media reports make it sound like this is a huge problem and it may be just a few).I just don't want to have to go from pharmacy to pharmacy to get the pill EVEN THOUGH I am not going to be using it for birth control but to get my blood thick enough that I can actually walk from my car to my office, mow the lawn, do anything that ups my heart rate at all, without getting an angina attack.I swear that if I went and they won't give it I will probably be arrested because of the fit I am going to throw. I do not even want to discuss it with the doctor if it is going to be a big pain to get the prescription filled. I would rather lie gasping in the front yard with severe chest pain.I know I am probably being irrational.K.


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## Lagomorph (Mar 4, 2005)

I have never heard of that. I've been on the pill for 14 years and I have never had a problem filling it. I don't want to make any assumptions about where you live but that goes against your freedom to choose, doesn't it? The pill is prescribed for many reasons not just birth control. Once you have a prescription from a doctor how can a pharmacist refuse to fill it?! I'm a little astonished by those pharmacists. I'm happy to be living where I am. Good luck and maybe do some research on which pharmacy's are not filling the prescriptions and find the ones that are.


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## Kathleen M. (Nov 16, 1999)

This is in the US. Birth control pills according to some are the exact same thing as getting an abortion every month and filling those prescriptions is against the pharmacists freedom to avoid being a part of killing babies each and every month.They had one guy on one of the news shows last night who claims he will not play a roll in poisoning healthy woman every month (would not admit it was about abortion it was about this drug is WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAYYYYYYYYYYYYYY TOO DANGEROUS TO give to ANYONE ANYTIME FOR ANY REASON NO MATTER WHAT...he was a serious zealot). And any potentially fertilized egg is a patient too, and they don't want to harm them either.Sigh.I don't know if it is a few that are a problem, a few have been fired, but some states are making legislation about this. Mostly it sounds like on the side of pharmacists not having to fill prescriptions they have moral objections to.Haven't heard of not filling viagra pills because men might use it to fornicate with woman they are not married to.But that is the same issue as some insurance will cover viagra but not birth control pills.K.


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## Kathleen M. (Nov 16, 1999)

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/artic...-2005Mar27.htmlhttp://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2004-1...ists-pill_x.htmhttp://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/c...ack=1&cset=truehttp://mediamatters.org/items/200503300002I just want to know if this is a small isolate problem getting a lot of media attention or something that is becoming so widespread that woman really can't get access to the pill.K.


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## tkelly (May 11, 2004)

Kath,I, too, have heard about this problem a bit from the local news radio shows I listen to. From what I gathered, this would be more of a problem in small towns.Now, I haven't taken the pill for a good long while, but I would think I would hear a lot of complaining from the women I know if they had problems getting their precriptions filled. I haven't heard ANY woman complain about it. I know that back when I was taking the pill, I never had a problem with pharmacists and that was several years ago. You would think if there was a problem, it would have been back then.So, I'm inclined to think this is a small problem that's been blown out of proportion. I'm not sure what town exactly you live in, but if it's a fair-sized one, I would say you shouldn't have much problem.


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## 20708 (Mar 28, 2005)

My thoughts about the women pharmacists who won't fill bc pill rx's is that these are fundamentalists living in the Bible Belt. Having lived one year in GA, that doesn't surprise me.I find it appalling and they should be outright fired for that. How dare they expect everyone to believe what they believe!


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## Kathleen M. (Nov 16, 1999)

Apparently there is a new group of pro-lifers that are pharamcists that are causing the problem. I think it is recent and wasn't an issue a few years ago.That and a few states recently passed laws saying phamacists don't have to fill prescriptions they don't agree with (I think just on morals).I just wish they would be consistant if they would only give to married woman (which is one group) and question all the men getting Viagra if they were married, but I'm sure they don't do that







Quite a few pharmacies apparently require the prescription to be filled, so if anyone there is an objecter there must be someone else on staff to fill it.http://www.pfli.org/ is the group behind most of this. There are some 1600 of them, I don't know how long they have been a group.K.


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## Lagomorph (Mar 4, 2005)

Even in our modern times we live in a male dominated society. I think pharmacists should separate their moral beliefs from their job of prescribing people in need of medications. Politics and religion are a bad mix. We should be moving forward not backwards. Men have their own rules (or are above them?) in our society. I don't want to infringe on anyones beliefs but this pharmacist issue is not giving women their right to choose. And the fact is that the pill is not only for birth control. But men will always get viagra. You know on another note in China you can buy the date rape drug from a pharmacist. Married women buy it to not have to remember sex with their husbands. From one extreme to another!


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## M&M (Jan 20, 2002)

Wow! Weird! I haven't heard anything about that. Scary though.I live in Southern Indiana - I'm not sure if that's technically part of "the Bible Belt", but it tends to be rather "rural" in beliefs, etc.I've been on the pill for 10 years, all here in Southern Indiana, and I haven't ever had any inkling of a problem. I hope you don't either Kath!


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## tkelly (May 11, 2004)

Hmmmmmm, interesting.I didn't know it was a new group that was doing this. I've just heard bits and pieces and of it.I think what's even more ironic than refusing women b.c. pills but giving men Viagra, is that it's not o.k. for women to use birth control pills but it's o.k. for men to use condoms?? And these are even sold over the counter yet! Yes, you can say that condoms are used to prevent aids, stds, etc., but as lag pointed out there are other uses for b.c pills than just contraception. Talk about a double standard.On the other hand, I guess you could argue that doctors aren't required to perform abortions or other procedures they feel are immoral, so why should pharmacists be held to a different standard? And as long as other parmacies are available, it shouldn't be a huge problem.Looks like I have conflicting views on this.


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## Kathleen M. (Nov 16, 1999)

Yep, I get the conflicted thing too.But some of what I consider immoral prescriptions and what seems to be what is targetted don't necessarily align







I heard on the news that it looks like NC is about to make it so they don't have to give out Morning After Pills. So it looks like this may soon be an issue here.If you won't distribute those the EXACT SAME arguements are used for regular BCP.But they will still have condoms and Viagra readily available I am sure







Men must be allowed to be virile but woman should never have sex...but hell no about letting the men just have sex with each other





















Seems that homosexual male sex solves a bunch of the contridictions in society







K.


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## Lagomorph (Mar 4, 2005)

That's funny Kath. Where I live they just allowed the morning after pill to be available without a prescription from the pharmacy.


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## NancyCat (Jul 16, 1999)

Kath-First I have to say that I live in Massachusetts, most things are fine up in this neck of the woods. I have read about pharmacists not wanting to dispense the emergency morning after pill but havent heard anything about birth control pills. I know that in MA that doctors and nurses dont have to participate in abortion proceedures if they are uncomfortable doing so. I would imagine that pharmacists would have that same option, there are usually several of them or techs who would be able to cover. If your insurance permits it you could probably get bcp's online from CVS or Wallgreens. Some insurances offer mail away options for 3 month supplies of medication. I wish I could go on the pill again but I'm to old (51) and I smoke (associated w/stroke in bcp taking smokers over 35). I felt great when I took it, my periods were lighter and pretty much cramp free, regular and I think they help w/hot flashes too. My IBS was better then too.


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## Kathleen M. (Nov 16, 1999)

Here is a column in today's paper.Most of it is problems getting Emergency Contraception, but there are reports of pharmacists not filling Birth control pills pretty close to here.Sigh.


> quote:*Just pass the pills, drug dude*By RUTH SHEEHAN, Staff WriterBefore there's a move to canonize the Kerr Drug pharmacist in Wakefield who refused to fill a married couple's prescription for Emergency Contraception, let's consider two things:First, Emergency Contraception (please don't call it the morning-after pill) is NOT the abortion pill. It is BIRTH CONTROL.Second, we are on a dangerously slippery slope here.It began in January, when it looked as if the FDA might finally make EC available at drugstores, over the counter without a prescription. Then conservatives rallied, the FDA again retreated, and in George Bush's America, so-called "Pharmacists for Life" began feeling their oats. Suddenly, pharmacists in states that allow it, including ours, began raising moral objections to filling prescriptions for Emergency Contraception, which is BIRTH CONTROL.Unlike RU-486 --for which it is often mistaken, even by druggists -- EC uses hormones like those in birth control pills. Taken within three days of unprotected sex (the condom broke!), it can delay ovulation, prevent fertilization and, as a last resort, prevent implantation of a fertilized egg in the womb.It prevents pregnancy, it does not end it.If you are pregnant without knowing it, taking the EC pills WILL NOT WORK. They will not hurt the fetus.Got that?According to the Alan Guttmacher Institute, greater availability of Emergency Contraception could prevent 1.7 million unplanned pregnancies and 800,000 abortions. Even if the institute's estimates are inflated, isn't preventing any unwanted pregnancy, or abortion, a good thing?Not this way, apparently.Leigh Ann Robbins, who runs the DIAL EC hotline for Planned Parenthood statewide (by the way, that number is (866) 942-7762), said she has received a "flurry" of calls since the beginning of the year. Every other week, she encounters another pharmacist refusing to fill EC prescriptions.Most of the complaining pharmacists have expressed their objections to Planned Parenthood. And Planned Parenthood has found other druggists to fill the request -- a tricky job in rural parts.Other pharmacists, like the one at Wakefield's Kerr Drug, have confronted patients directly.One passive-aggressive pharmacist just kept telling the young woman that he couldn't fill her prescription for EC because he didn't have any pills in stock, even though Planned Parenthood checked -- and he did.Since when does the person who fills the prescriptions -- and scans the Tic Tacs and Kleenex -- get to decide the morality of what you and your health care provider decide you need?Sadly, you don't need to be a fortuneteller to guess what happens next. In fact, it's already happening. Right here.Robbins recently got a call from a woman in Chatham County who was being hassled by her pharmacist about filling her prescription for regular ol' birth control pills. Moral objection. What next, a morality test for a pack of rubbers?This should be a wake-up call, especially to women of childbearing age in this state. This slope is so slippery it's terrifying.Ruth Sheehan can be reached at 829-4828 or rsheehan###newsobserver.com


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## *Luna* (Nov 19, 2001)

I've never had any problems getting my pills.Pills are prescribed for a variety of reasons, as you know. The Roman Catholic church forbids birth control use but accepts the use of birth control pills for medical reasons.


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## Cartoon Creature (Jul 12, 2002)

Wow I havent heard anything about this whole morning after pill and birth control pill thing. Im very suprised to hear about it. There is a HUGE differance between getting and abortion and taking the pill. Its just and egg, a potential baby. Are they going to say that we murder every single month when we get our periods.I think it is the stupidest thing I have ever heard of and they need to get of thier soap box's, shut thier pie holes and fill out the perscriptions. On the other hand they cant quit and leave pharmacy for the ppl who can do it.Sorry if that was a little to harsh for some







..... ima nice person really







lol


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## 17309 (May 7, 2005)

Here in Madison, Wisconsin, there are huge problems with the pharmacists, and there's even a bill in the legislature that would ban all UW schools from distributing birth control. However, the bill probably won't pass, and the "huge" problem really means that it is happened to a few people. Which IS A HUGE PROBLEM, but it most likely will not happen to you. And if it does happen to you, just go to the next Walgreen's down the street.It makes me sick that this is happening, but I suppose the IBS forum isn't the place to rage about that







But really, it is my greatest fear that some right-wing religious fanatic will butt into my business (ie refusing pills, Terry Shaivo stuff). If you have been denied pills, or if you want to write letters to editors or do something about it, go to plannedparenthood.org; they're very active about it. And thank God for that!


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## Nikki (Jul 11, 2000)

That is one of the utterly most stupid things ive ever heard and those people need their heads checking.Nikki


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## 23682 (Jun 24, 2005)

I've heard of some pharmacists refusing people normal birth control, but they were deeply religious ones.I've heard more stories about them refusing to give out the morning after pill. The MAP is birth control, certain brands like one I used to take Lo-Ovral and I think there is one more brand, they are regular birth control pills but are specficlly given in larger doses to cause a miscarriage if you take it I believe within 72 hours of a rape or unprotected sex.


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## Kathleen M. (Nov 16, 1999)

We have a new Walgreens in town and I ended up going there. Got Yasmine and the AOK from the doctor to try to do it for the 9 weeks straight routine.I think I saw they were one pharmacy that was making sure people got prescriptions and they had a $20 certificate with new prescriptions.I might move all mine over there as they are much less busy so far than where I've been getting them so maybe it will be less annoying to pick things up.Assuming the insurance coverage stays there....sometimes the stuff I have goes though negotiations and everyone threatens to pull out and it gets annoying.K.


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## Lagomorph (Mar 4, 2005)

I'm glad that you found a place to fill them with ease.


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