A Directionally Challenged Special: How NOT to Order Medication Before Going Oversees

A Directionally Challenged Special: How NOT to Order Medication Before Going Oversees

            This really should go in “Travel Generics” but since not everybody has to keep their medication on them at all times while travelling, I figured it would be superfluous. Today, however, I realized that what I have learned through necessity may come in handy during random travels, and not just abroad (though mostly abroad).

            As everyone in America knows, insurance can be a nasty piece of work. I’m partially convinced that every pharmacist in America has a holographic projector like Darth Vader in The Empire Strikes Back, where they kneel on a circular dais and the holographic logo of the insurance company they want to speak with appears before them.

            Theatrics aside, it’s important to let your doctors know when you’re skipping town for a month. There may be vaccines you need, or other tests you will need to get when you come back depending on where you go. For instance, when I was small(er) my family went on a cruise through the Panama canal courtesy of my late Grammy. It was amazing, but when we got back to America my brother and I went in for a check up at the pediatrician: turns out, TB was still an issue in some areas of South America so one lucky volunteer got a TB test. If it came back negative, odds were none of us were exposed. If it came back positive, everyone else would get tested and treated as needed.

            This wasn’t the last time this particular thing would happen, and I always ended up winning the “lab rat” lottery. If you’ve never had a TB test, those things hurt—they don’t jab you with one needle, it’s more like a cluster. I suppose it could be worse, though, since my mother still has the scar from her small pox vaccination.

            Anyway, when you leave town and all needles and vaccines aside, any medication you’re currently taking needs to be refilled by your doctor, especially if you’re staying longer than a month. Always take the bottle with the prescription on it: Never carry unlabeled pills through security, let alone customs. This is for your own insurance, in case you loose your meds, and so that the TSA doesn’t confiscate your antibiotics thinking its LSD.

            Now ideally—and you’d think I’d KNOW this by now—you should start the process of calling your doctors, etc. at least two weeks before hand. That way, if your insurance decides to put up any barriers you have time to weasel your way around them. Most insurance companies have what they call a “vacation override” that lets you refill your meds for no extra fee. Depending on the provider, this can happen multiple times or just once a year.

            This morning, Mother’s Day Sunday, I awoke without having gotten an email from Walgreens about my pills. I had waited until the week before (read: last Wen.) to call my doctor for the refill, and I had thought it would be taken care of by Friday at least. So I called Walgreens.

            Turns out, they had gotten the order for 90 days but my insurance had put a hold on it because I had just done a regular monthly refill about a week earlier around the 5^th. I started panicking. It’s Sunday, the day before I leave, a “Hallmark Holiday,” and somehow the Walgreens pharmacy was going to make contact with the Mother Ship at BlueCross/Shield HQ before their pharmacy closed at 5pm?!

            Luckily, the head pharmacist on call at Walgreens worked a minor miracle and within two hours of calling I had my once-yearly 90-day “vacation override” for all my meds, ready to be picked up at no additional co-pay.

            Bottom line: Don’t wait until the weekend before you leave to get your meds. And to the valiant Walgreen’s Pharmacist, if you ever read this: Thank You. You are truly a woman worthy of many praises and awards, and I will make a special toast to you once I get to Hokkaido. Or three.