They won't refill my Zoloft - what do I do?
May 4, 2017 1:23 PM Subscribe
My doctor is denying me a refill of my Zoloft pending an appointment. I received no advance notice of this. I have none left. Please help me - what the fuck do I do?
Apparently it is required that I see my doctor yearly in order to keep my prescription. Having never been told this by my doctor or anyone working at his office before, I found this out when I went to refill the prescription and was told the doctor himself had denied it. They are telling me there is nothing they can do until I see them.
The problem is that I do not live anywhere near there anymore, because I went away to college. Having been unaware that this was something that could happen, I did not rush to get a new doctor.
Is there anything I can do short of skip all my classes and drive several hours for an emergency appointment? Can an urgent care help me with this or something? When I have forgotten my pills or run out in the past, I have usually started to feel really shitty within two days, if not one. Is that enough time for me to do something? Thank you all for your help.
Apparently it is required that I see my doctor yearly in order to keep my prescription. Having never been told this by my doctor or anyone working at his office before, I found this out when I went to refill the prescription and was told the doctor himself had denied it. They are telling me there is nothing they can do until I see them.
The problem is that I do not live anywhere near there anymore, because I went away to college. Having been unaware that this was something that could happen, I did not rush to get a new doctor.
Is there anything I can do short of skip all my classes and drive several hours for an emergency appointment? Can an urgent care help me with this or something? When I have forgotten my pills or run out in the past, I have usually started to feel really shitty within two days, if not one. Is that enough time for me to do something? Thank you all for your help.
Best answer: Does your college have on-campus health services? "I need an emergency supply of this SSRI I already take" is something most primary care docs should be able to do no problem.
posted by R a c h e l at 1:28 PM on May 4, 2017 [21 favorites]
posted by R a c h e l at 1:28 PM on May 4, 2017 [21 favorites]
Best answer: Definitely call your university health center. They very likely have a protocol in place for a situation like this. Mental health issues are a huge concern for university health centers.
posted by mccxxiii at 1:29 PM on May 4, 2017 [4 favorites]
posted by mccxxiii at 1:29 PM on May 4, 2017 [4 favorites]
Your pharmacy may give you 3-5 days of emergency meds to get you through. Ask them if they can give you that much until you can get an appointment. And yes, your school's health center should be able to help you. That's what they are there for.
posted by Medieval Maven at 1:30 PM on May 4, 2017 [14 favorites]
posted by Medieval Maven at 1:30 PM on May 4, 2017 [14 favorites]
Take your bottle to anybody who's a doctor or nurse practitioner who can see you today - school clinic, urgent care, Planned Parenthood, you may live in a state where some drugstore/superstore chains have a clinic right there. It'll cost you an office fee probably.
You don't need an emergency prescription, you just need a new local prescribing doctor. Zoloft has no trendy street value, and it's dangerous to go off abruptly, you should have no problems getting it renewed just as long as you can get in front of someone who can write a scrip.
posted by Lyn Never at 1:32 PM on May 4, 2017 [28 favorites]
You don't need an emergency prescription, you just need a new local prescribing doctor. Zoloft has no trendy street value, and it's dangerous to go off abruptly, you should have no problems getting it renewed just as long as you can get in front of someone who can write a scrip.
posted by Lyn Never at 1:32 PM on May 4, 2017 [28 favorites]
Yes, go to university health center or, if that's not an option, urgent care. They can help. If you have any prescription bottles/receipts, take them with you as well as your doctor's contact info.
posted by zennie at 1:39 PM on May 4, 2017 [3 favorites]
posted by zennie at 1:39 PM on May 4, 2017 [3 favorites]
It seems like you have a consensus here already. Other options just to have if you ever need them:
-Call the prescribing doctor, explain that you're going to get a local appt ASAP, and ask them to call in a one-month fill to take the stress off you, or at least one week if they won't go for a full month. This is usually something doctors are willing to do with antidepressants so you don't have to go off them abruptly.
-If you've moved semi-permanently to where your colege is, a university health center is a good bet. If you return to where you grew up over the summer, talk with the doctor to make sure in the future all prescriptions expire in August so it'll be easy for you to avoid this in the future.
What a pain for you!! Sorry this happened.
posted by epj at 2:01 PM on May 4, 2017 [3 favorites]
-Call the prescribing doctor, explain that you're going to get a local appt ASAP, and ask them to call in a one-month fill to take the stress off you, or at least one week if they won't go for a full month. This is usually something doctors are willing to do with antidepressants so you don't have to go off them abruptly.
-If you've moved semi-permanently to where your colege is, a university health center is a good bet. If you return to where you grew up over the summer, talk with the doctor to make sure in the future all prescriptions expire in August so it'll be easy for you to avoid this in the future.
What a pain for you!! Sorry this happened.
posted by epj at 2:01 PM on May 4, 2017 [3 favorites]
Best answer: Both my partner and I had this same experience in college. Don't panic. Running out of meds and can be really scary and I know it always sends me into an anxiety spiral, so I just want to make sure you take a minute to make sure you're calm.
I'm going to outline your next steps. For all of these, bring your medication bottles and your doctor's contact information.
1) Go to your college's health center and explain the situation. Ask if they can prescribe you a new Zoloft prescription. It's very likely they'll be both willing and able to, because it's not a frequently abused drug. My college's health center had no problem prescribing Zoloft (though they did refuse to prescribe Ritalin). If they can see you and give you the prescription now, you can stop here--you've solved the immediate problem, and you can continue to get your prescriptions from the health center during your time at college. If they can refill the prescription, but not today (for example, at my college, the nurse who can prescribe medications is only there Tuesdays and Thursdays), then go to step 2. If they can't or won't fill the prescription at all, go to step 3.
2) Go to your pharmacy and ask for an emergency supply to cover you until your appointment. This is a very common request, so they'll likely give it to you.
3) If your college health center won't refill the prescription, ask them to refer you to a general practitioner in the area. If you can be seen by one in a couple of days, then go to your pharmacy and get an emergency supply of medication. If it's more than a few days, or if for some reason you can't get an emergency supply and you feel like you can't make it that long without your meds, then go to step 4.
4) Look for any walk-in clinics in your area. The college health center will probably be able to help with this. If you're in a large city, you probably will have access to one of these, but if you're in a small town, it's less likely. If there isn't one in your area, jump on the internet and see if there's one in a nearby city or town. If there isn't one within reasonable distance, go to step 5.
5) Go to urgent care. This is a last resort as it's the most expensive, but it's there if all of the above fails you.
This is repeating a lot of what other people said, but I wanted to lay it out clearly so you know your options and how they relate to each other. I know it's hard for me to parse out which option to try first and not jump straight to urgent care, so I hope this helps. Best of luck.
posted by brook horse at 2:06 PM on May 4, 2017 [18 favorites]
I'm going to outline your next steps. For all of these, bring your medication bottles and your doctor's contact information.
1) Go to your college's health center and explain the situation. Ask if they can prescribe you a new Zoloft prescription. It's very likely they'll be both willing and able to, because it's not a frequently abused drug. My college's health center had no problem prescribing Zoloft (though they did refuse to prescribe Ritalin). If they can see you and give you the prescription now, you can stop here--you've solved the immediate problem, and you can continue to get your prescriptions from the health center during your time at college. If they can refill the prescription, but not today (for example, at my college, the nurse who can prescribe medications is only there Tuesdays and Thursdays), then go to step 2. If they can't or won't fill the prescription at all, go to step 3.
2) Go to your pharmacy and ask for an emergency supply to cover you until your appointment. This is a very common request, so they'll likely give it to you.
3) If your college health center won't refill the prescription, ask them to refer you to a general practitioner in the area. If you can be seen by one in a couple of days, then go to your pharmacy and get an emergency supply of medication. If it's more than a few days, or if for some reason you can't get an emergency supply and you feel like you can't make it that long without your meds, then go to step 4.
4) Look for any walk-in clinics in your area. The college health center will probably be able to help with this. If you're in a large city, you probably will have access to one of these, but if you're in a small town, it's less likely. If there isn't one in your area, jump on the internet and see if there's one in a nearby city or town. If there isn't one within reasonable distance, go to step 5.
5) Go to urgent care. This is a last resort as it's the most expensive, but it's there if all of the above fails you.
This is repeating a lot of what other people said, but I wanted to lay it out clearly so you know your options and how they relate to each other. I know it's hard for me to parse out which option to try first and not jump straight to urgent care, so I hope this helps. Best of luck.
posted by brook horse at 2:06 PM on May 4, 2017 [18 favorites]
If the campus health center won't help you, call the doctor's office and ask them to phone in a month or even a week's supply.
posted by bq at 2:34 PM on May 4, 2017 [1 favorite]
posted by bq at 2:34 PM on May 4, 2017 [1 favorite]
They are telling me there is nothing they can do until I see them.
'They' being the pharmacy? Call the doctor's office, make the appointment, ask them to cover you until the appointment. If that fails, university health care.
There is almost always a way around this stuff, Zoloft isn't the kind of thing people abuse for yuks. Try not to freak out too much -- I know the bureaucratic horrors at play, but this circumstance isn't all that unique, and sometimes people just drone policy when they just don't feel like doing the tiniest bit of legwork or making a phone call. Talk to the next person, then talk to the next person.
posted by A Terrible Llama at 3:22 PM on May 4, 2017
'They' being the pharmacy? Call the doctor's office, make the appointment, ask them to cover you until the appointment. If that fails, university health care.
There is almost always a way around this stuff, Zoloft isn't the kind of thing people abuse for yuks. Try not to freak out too much -- I know the bureaucratic horrors at play, but this circumstance isn't all that unique, and sometimes people just drone policy when they just don't feel like doing the tiniest bit of legwork or making a phone call. Talk to the next person, then talk to the next person.
posted by A Terrible Llama at 3:22 PM on May 4, 2017
(I don't mean you don't feel like doing the legwork--I mean I think you got stuck with someone who refused to do legwork. My pharmacy would have made the call for me with my promise I would follow up and make the appointment with the doctor.)
posted by A Terrible Llama at 3:23 PM on May 4, 2017
posted by A Terrible Llama at 3:23 PM on May 4, 2017
It sounds like you haven't talked to the doctor's office, only the pharmacy? Try calling the doctor. Explain your situation. My guess is that this is sort of a reflexive response from the doctor, but that they'll ease the policy when you call. Ask for another month's refill, and either make an appt for when you'll be home this summer (?) or go see someone at the on-campus clinic.
posted by radioamy at 3:48 PM on May 4, 2017
posted by radioamy at 3:48 PM on May 4, 2017
It was probably not the doctor himself. Most likely, it was a staff member following a policy. This happened to me once. Fortunately, I was able to talk directly to my doctor, who didn't even know this had happened. I made an appointment to see him, and he called in a new prescription to cover me in the interim. Can you call the office and ask to speak to him?
posted by FencingGal at 4:14 PM on May 4, 2017 [1 favorite]
posted by FencingGal at 4:14 PM on May 4, 2017 [1 favorite]
I can't tell if you actually talked to your original doctor. Can you call his office and ask about a prescription to tide you over until you can get seen somewhere local? If not, I also recommend your university health center. My university even had an "urgent care" that was attached to the student health center and actually quite affordable for students, so this may be an option at your school.
posted by rainbowbrite at 4:24 PM on May 4, 2017
posted by rainbowbrite at 4:24 PM on May 4, 2017
Oh, my post was assuming you heard this from the doctor. If you heard it from the pharmacy, definitely call the doctor before doing any of those steps! When this happened to my partner they gave them another month's supply with instructions to either make an appointment or see a general practitioner.
posted by brook horse at 4:47 PM on May 4, 2017
posted by brook horse at 4:47 PM on May 4, 2017
Not a crisis. If you absolutely can't get in touch with your current doctor via phone so that they can call in a temporary prescription, make an appointment with a GP (you can even use Zocdoc to do this online) or visit urgent care (a.k.a. your nearest same-day medical visit vendor). They'll get you a script and help you sort things out with your faraway doctor.
posted by theraflu at 5:37 PM on May 4, 2017
posted by theraflu at 5:37 PM on May 4, 2017
Best answer: Just chiming it to say this happened to me just this January. Got only 30 pills instead of 90 with an all caps "MUST SEE DOCTOR BEFORE FURTHER REFILLS" on the label like some kind of condescending robot. It sent me into an anxiety spiral like nobody's business and I had barely two days' left before I saw her and that was only because I "accidentally" skipped a bunch here and there like a fool.
Suffice it to say when I *did* get to my doctor I ranted at her about how completely idiotic the policy was, how Zoloft isn't something kids use to get high, how it's fucking dangerous to go off it without supervision so if you're not able to see a doctor then you should absolutely be able to get more of it until you can, how WTF they lied to me when I ordered three more months of Zoloft and sprung the deadline on me with no warning and I'd even paid in full for the 90 doses and only got 30, blah blah blah for a solid, like, twenty minutes. Thank god, she's actually a fantastic GP who I've stuck with specifically because she's chill with a lot of my brain stuff and let me run out of steam before talking to me.
So she apologized for the weird all-caps condescension and the surprise deadline. She didn't tell me that if it happened again I could probably ask for an emergency supply at a pharmacist, which would have been nice, so kudos to AskMe, will remember this when it inevitably happens again. But what she did do was explain the underlying reasoning behind this policy. For most people (not me, of course, why would life be so easy) being on an SSRI is a temporary thing because ideally *anxiety* is a temporary thing. And because they can really change a lot of things about a person's lifestyle depending on side effects (like weight retention, libido changes, interactions with food or alcohol, contraindication with common meds, issues with blood pressure, etc) the end goal for a lot of patient care plans is to get them off the SSRI and handling the causes of their anxiety through other means that aren't medication-centered. Every year or more often a doctor who is handling mental health of their patient needs to have a check in with them about their goals and intentions and progress in terms of if they want to stay on the SSRI or not, and if that's a good idea with other health issues they might have begun having while on the SSRI.
I of course intend to take Zoloft to help me deal with crap I've been dealing with unmedicated since I was 11 years old, until it doesn't help any more, in which case I'll be exploring other medication options at that time. When I stated this clearly to her my doctor didn't even bat an eyelash. She was like "yeah, okay, it's just policy I had to say that to you and ask about the other things you do to help manage the symptoms you have, here's your full year's worth of refills, look at my computer monitor as I type this in and submit it so you don't have anxiety about that." Then we talked about it some more. She said that in my case, if this happens again, I don't actually need to see her in person. I can request a phone consultation, or even email her through the health network that we're on. Granted I've got some spiffy private healthcare going on in the mental-illness-aware PNW. But a lot of doctors these days will do long distance stuff like that, especially for repeat prescriptions for drugs that are unwise to abruptly stop.
Just sharing my experience with this. I think it's one of the stupidest things I've run into in my short time of actually doing something about my mental health, but it is what it is for now. I'm sorry you're having to deal with it too but it's not an emergency and you aren't alone in your worry and annoyance.
posted by Mizu at 6:58 PM on May 4, 2017 [1 favorite]
Suffice it to say when I *did* get to my doctor I ranted at her about how completely idiotic the policy was, how Zoloft isn't something kids use to get high, how it's fucking dangerous to go off it without supervision so if you're not able to see a doctor then you should absolutely be able to get more of it until you can, how WTF they lied to me when I ordered three more months of Zoloft and sprung the deadline on me with no warning and I'd even paid in full for the 90 doses and only got 30, blah blah blah for a solid, like, twenty minutes. Thank god, she's actually a fantastic GP who I've stuck with specifically because she's chill with a lot of my brain stuff and let me run out of steam before talking to me.
So she apologized for the weird all-caps condescension and the surprise deadline. She didn't tell me that if it happened again I could probably ask for an emergency supply at a pharmacist, which would have been nice, so kudos to AskMe, will remember this when it inevitably happens again. But what she did do was explain the underlying reasoning behind this policy. For most people (not me, of course, why would life be so easy) being on an SSRI is a temporary thing because ideally *anxiety* is a temporary thing. And because they can really change a lot of things about a person's lifestyle depending on side effects (like weight retention, libido changes, interactions with food or alcohol, contraindication with common meds, issues with blood pressure, etc) the end goal for a lot of patient care plans is to get them off the SSRI and handling the causes of their anxiety through other means that aren't medication-centered. Every year or more often a doctor who is handling mental health of their patient needs to have a check in with them about their goals and intentions and progress in terms of if they want to stay on the SSRI or not, and if that's a good idea with other health issues they might have begun having while on the SSRI.
I of course intend to take Zoloft to help me deal with crap I've been dealing with unmedicated since I was 11 years old, until it doesn't help any more, in which case I'll be exploring other medication options at that time. When I stated this clearly to her my doctor didn't even bat an eyelash. She was like "yeah, okay, it's just policy I had to say that to you and ask about the other things you do to help manage the symptoms you have, here's your full year's worth of refills, look at my computer monitor as I type this in and submit it so you don't have anxiety about that." Then we talked about it some more. She said that in my case, if this happens again, I don't actually need to see her in person. I can request a phone consultation, or even email her through the health network that we're on. Granted I've got some spiffy private healthcare going on in the mental-illness-aware PNW. But a lot of doctors these days will do long distance stuff like that, especially for repeat prescriptions for drugs that are unwise to abruptly stop.
Just sharing my experience with this. I think it's one of the stupidest things I've run into in my short time of actually doing something about my mental health, but it is what it is for now. I'm sorry you're having to deal with it too but it's not an emergency and you aren't alone in your worry and annoyance.
posted by Mizu at 6:58 PM on May 4, 2017 [1 favorite]
I work in a pharmacy and frequently have to explain prescriber rejections to patients. Usually the doc (if it's even a doc- oftentimes it's their nurse aids) will just not a note and fax it back in to us. We can't give out any additional meds BUT you can ask the pharmacist on duty to give you and emergency supply. It's usually a five day suplly, enough for you to get in with the doc or somewhere else. Ask for that first- you should have no issue getting one and if you need to, ask for the pharmacy manager if they give you the runaround. Then call your original documents and ask to speak directly to his nurse. Explain that you are not able to make an appointment because of time and space, that you are getting in with another doctor but need an additional script to tide you over. They may have to call you back after actually speaking to the doctor first, but again it's not like Zoloft has a ton of side effects that need constant blood tests like some of the psych meds and you really don't want to cold turkey an SSRI if you can avoid it. Once youve secured your drugs for the month, look into getting a good local doc. Most GPs will prescribe psych meds if you've been taking them already, especially a relatively safe one like Zoloft. Your school should have resources in helping you find one if you cant see one in campus.
posted by shesaysgo at 9:44 PM on May 4, 2017 [1 favorite]
posted by shesaysgo at 9:44 PM on May 4, 2017 [1 favorite]
Call your doctor and say this is an emergency. Explain the situation to him. If he's human, he'll give you a refill.
posted by xammerboy at 12:02 PM on May 5, 2017 [1 favorite]
posted by xammerboy at 12:02 PM on May 5, 2017 [1 favorite]
Check your MeFi mail please.
posted by storminator7 at 12:10 PM on May 5, 2017
posted by storminator7 at 12:10 PM on May 5, 2017
This thread is closed to new comments.
posted by holborne at 1:26 PM on May 4, 2017 [57 favorites]