Oh, I’m ranting

I could SCREAM. Actually, I sat and cried for a bit yesterday, but I feel like punching something.

I’m still not convinced it’s going to work out since I just called and was told that my prescription is pending authorization, but here is the saga of me trying to get Lilly the medicine she needs.

Following our Thursday night appointment, the behaviorist faxed the prescription recommendation to our family veterinarian Friday afternoon. I called Saturday morning around 10 am to make sure it’d been called into the human pharmacy we use. It not only had NOT been called it, it would NOT be called in because there wasn’t a veterinarian at the hospital that day. Yes, a Saturday. There was supposed to be, but wasn’t … just like on June 17 when I drove Lilly down for her exam for naught.

So, on Monday, I waited until 11 am to call and see if the prescription had been called in. It hadn’t, but promises were made. Then, 2 hours later, I get a call, telling me that the Walgreens I use doesn’t have the drug in the right dosages (20, 40, & 60 mg) that I needed. They only come in 25, 50, and 75 mg capsules that cannot be divided. That means, I’d have to have them specially compounded at another pharmacy (much farther away), but no one seemed to know how that would be done, who’d have to OK it, etc.

I called our behaviorist and left a message asking for help. When she called back, she recommended trying to get my vet to script out the order to another local hospital that had the drug in-house. So, I called the 2 big referral practices in the Denver area that I know, and NEITHER of them had the drug in the building. One of them, however, recommended a practice (just a regular one) that might have it. I called them, and indeed they did have the drug in stock. BUT, they would not fill it, even if my veterinarian asked them to, without seeing Lilly for an exam.

Now, I totally get the whole doctor-patient relationship thing. I really do, but clearly Lilly has a VET, she’s seen a specialist at CSU for pete’s sake (all of which I explained). Thanks … for … NOTHING!

My other options were to drive 2-hours each way to pick up the medicine at CSU (if I could make it in time before the pharmacy closed … which is why I couldn’t get the first week’s worth of pills while I was there in the first place). OR, just order the darn medicine online … which is something I’ve never done.

Since staff at my regular vet essentially pushed the responsibility for figuring out the online thing myself, I made several more calls. Despite causing yet another delay in Lilly’s treatment, I ordered it online Monday afternoon. The behaviorist will have a veterinarian at CSU approve the order.

Shipping is free, but to get 6 weeks worth of Clomicalm is nearly $150. The nice thing about Clomicalm is that it’s in tablet form, so the pills can be split to make different dosages as needed. BUT, if Lilly could somehow use the dosages in the human or generic form (capsules), it would only be around $25 a month once we get up to the higher dose.

I’m not kidding … $25 for people, $150 for dogs.

In addition to pandering for sympathy or shared indignation, here’s why I’m telling you this … Living outside a city the size of Denver (despite perceptions elsewhere that it’s a hick town) it should NOT be this hard to get what Lilly needs. I think it means that veterinary medicine, as a whole, doesn’t take cases like ours seriously.

I might have been able to call around and find the med locally, if I had all the time in the world, but I feared being pushed to the brink by someone else telling me they won’t fill the prescription … as if I’m some kind of junkie looking for a fix. It’s not like I’m calling about ketamine for pity’s sake.

This whole medicine quest is exponentially exasperating in a way that even my best words cannot convey.

So, while I wean Lilly off the amitriptyline, with the knowledge of that many behaviors I thought meant something else really mean she’s out-of-her-mind anxious, I’m in for a tough few days until the meds arrive and begin to kick in.

I took detailed notes Monday so that we’d have something for comparison later, and Lilly interrupted me 16 times between 9 am and noon with anxiety-related behavior (mostly seeking my attention in a very determined manner). It makes an already stressful, deadline-soaked day even more so.

Behavior spikes like this are called Extinction Bursts, which is a scientific way of saying “It’s going to get worse before it gets better.”