My pharmacy chain just got the ability to eFax, or electronically request prescription refills. Up until now, we’ve had to print out a refill request form, put it on the fax machine (or in the case where we don’t have a fax number, call the doctor’s office), type in the number, and hope it goes through. (This is especially annoying because if it doesn’t go through the first time, our machine re-dials the last successfully dialed fax number.)
So what does this really mean? Well now, all I have to do is press (let me count them, 1, 2…) 5 keys, and a request is automatically send to the doctor’s office, either by fax or by SureScript (basically a secure email). A paper record automatically prints out, so we have a way of keeping track of requests we’ve made.
I haven’t played with all of the features yet, but I did manage to figure out how to put a note on one, specifically requesting a new rx with a reported increase in dose on a kid’s Pepcid rx. Let’s see how well it actually works.
One thing I don’t like is that on the faxed version, which the doctor has to manually fax back to us, the “refills” field doesn’t make it clear whether the doctor is authorizing say, 2 total refills, or this refill plus 2 (for a total of 3) like the old way does.
Oh well, I guess we’ll see how well it works. My hopes are high, so chances are, I’ll be disappointed.
