Double-barrelled names are about as useful as mitte: 0 on a prescription

One of the most baffling phenomena I have come across is the way people like to name their kids. None is more useless than DB names (yes! even first names!!). It's an inconvenience to write, an inconvenience to say and an inconvenience to read and type.

You know when you are making a Curam suspension and you have to peel off that paper seal top? Or the annoying desiccant that gets stuck at the exit point of the Synermox bottle? Yea, this is kind of like that. I can deal with it, but I'd rather not.

In a bid to show the world how "progressive" the couple are (you know, gender equality and all that), the two parents have forever doomed their child to facing the question "sorry, how do you spell that?" for the rest of their lives. All I have say to those parents is this: Congratulations, both of you have succeeded in making yourselves resemble a pretentious, Bono-like douche (oh yes, I did just go there, but best save that bono-rant for another day).

Be the bigger man/woman and let your partner name their kids with their last name.

Dispensing Errors - A Pharmacist's Worst Nightmare

Being The Pill Counter, there's probably no worse feeling (apart from actually killing a patient) than a patient bringing back a medication saying you have made a mistake, especially when you are up to your neck in scripts. No matter how urgent the other scripts are, you drop everything, not because you want to meet them in the pouring rain, but to sort the shit out in the hopes that the person does not complain to the HDC.

I am really thankful for some of the people I made the dispensing mistakes on. Why? Because they are so bloody nice about it even though it might've had dire effects on them. Here are just a few mistakes I've committed on the top of my head:

Let's implement the 80/20 principle in pharmacy - if you haven't already.

For those of you not familiar with the 80/20 principle (more formally known as the Pareto Principle), it's a basic rule of thumb stating that about "80% of the effects come from 20% of the causes".

In relation to pharmacy then, it becomes like this:

Pharmacist's Translation for the Common Folks - Part 1

From the moment you walk into a pharmacy till the moment you walk out with your trolley-full of meds, you might have had the pleasure of getting bombarded with a load of questions/remarks by your local pharmacist. Here is a run down of what they *really* want to say but restrained themselves so they can remain the "health professional that you see most often". Cause otherwise, you'll just be shifting yourself to the pharmacy down the road (or if you're in Auckland, the pharmacy directly opposite!!) and we would've failed miserably in trying to profit from your illness.

Merry Christmas!! But will it really be a merry one?

Alas Christmas is approaching and for a good deal of pharmacists working around NZ I think that means encountering rudeness, impatience and the lot.

Below are the types of people that I'll be expecting to serve for the next few weeks (with the sudden spike in numbers helped by the holiday season):