Dear editor,
Please join me in a fight to have the provincial government enact legislation preventing any pharmaceutical company from signing a contract with a healthcare facility that gives them a monopoly over prescription drugs being given to residents of the facility.
Currently, in Wetaskiwin, Pharmacare Financial Group of Edmonton has such a contract with Points West as well as with Good Shepherd.
Recently, my wife was suffering from severe pain in a hand-arm location and was prescribed a drug by the emergency room doctor. As it was in the late afternoon on a Friday I decided to have a local pharmacist fill that prescription but was told that legally they could not because of Pharmacare monopoly.
Not long before that incident my wife had been treated in the hospital for severe pain in the back. Upon discharge her doctor had prescribed a pain medication on the Friday of her discharge. This medication did not arrive until Monday!
Why should any resident of any healthcare facility not be able to choose the pharmacist of one’s choice to fill one’s prescription needs?
Don Geddes
Wetaskiwin