Healthcare Burns

For as long as I can remember, working in healthcare has been appealing to me. The chance to make a real impact in someone's life and help them be the healthiest version of themselves was something that drove me forward. Pharmacy school was long and hard, but I just imagined how rewarded I would feel in the future. That would make it all worth it. Cut to having moved my way up from intern to staff pharmacist to pharmacy manager in a chain pharmacy over the past 5 years, my thoughts on healthcare have changed dramatically.

Unrealistic, made up metrics and script goals rule chain pharmacies and there is little time left for the patient. Filling as many prescriptions as you can with little help during long 12-hour days on your feet with no break is the norm. At first, I thought I could push through, no problem. I am young and have student loan debt to pay off after all. My mantra has been, I'll just do the best I can and that will be good enough. I could not have been more wrong. Facing the same impossible workload and the same unapologetically rude customers day after day has broken me down. I could blame our current pandemic, but the problem started long before then and will continue long after.

Healthcare workers are chronically overworked and given unrealistic goals they are told to achieve. Pharmacy is just one example. Nurses and doctors face the same problems with understaffing, impossible workloads, and unrealistic corporate goals. The result is healthcare workers who started out wanting to help others losing compassion and becoming numb to the pain of others. I used to want to go above and beyond for my patients, but now I can barely do the minimum. I have to psych myself up during my 45-minute commute just to be able to start the day off with a positive attitude. An attitude which quickly fades as the pages of prescriptions roll in and patients begin to take their unhappiness about their own circumstances out on us. I never thought I would turn into someone like this. Unfulfilled, tired, unmoved by sad circumstances. If a healthcare worker has no compassion for others then how can they be a healthcare worker?

If the corporation I work for will not change, it will have to be me that changes. I tell myself to relax, not let the words of others get to me. Let it go. Bringing the stress of the day home will only make things worse. Having that 45-minute commute has become both a blessing and a curse these days. I unwind with music, plan my next story, play scenes in progress back in my mind. Anything is a welcome distraction from the feeling of being overwhelmed and powerless. The anxiety of my perfectionism comes back into my mind as I drive. If only I could have worked faster: done one more script, counseled one more person. No, I have to tell myself that I did all I could. I really, truly, did, after all. Not that I have much to show for it. All the others see are the scripts I was behind, the long wait times patients had, and the number of phone calls on hold. They will never see how my soul shatters each and every time a patient is told it will be another ten minutes. It is all about the patient after all. No one thinks twice about the person behind the prescription.

That's right, I was being positive and unwinding from my day. Sorry, back to that. I arrive home, exhausted, with just enough time to crawl into bed. It is another 12-hour day tomorrow, better get some sleep. The alarm clock rings a moment later, and the dread sinks in. Time for work.