My Doctor just Called it in...

If you work as a pharmacist or technician in a busy pharmacy, you hear it every day.

Every. Damn. Day.

Phone rings. You answer it:

"My doctor just called in a prescription for me. Is it ready?"

Let's define the word "just."

As an adverb, "just" means "within a brief preceding time; but a moment before." So if you say something just happened, it happened within moments in the past.

Now suppose for a moment you go on down to your favorite restaurant and you say, "My wife just called in an order to go. Is it ready?"

No, it's not ready. The meal has to be prepared. And I'll bet most people actually understand that. 

But not with pharmacy. For some reason, people think a medication appears out of thin air once it's called in by the physician or prescriber.

It's not. We NEED time to fill it. If we're busy, we need even MORE TIME to fill the prescription. Calling and asking us if it's ready right after you spoke with the physician actually makes it take LONGER to fill the prescription.

So, don't call the pharmacy right away. Give us some time. Otherwise all you're going to hear to the question, "Is it ready?" is....