Puna Pharmacy sale to Long's

[Puamanakai]

As many of you are aware, Puna Pharmacy (Scripp's Hawaii out of Seattle) sold their business to Long's. I found this out last week when I went to refill a prescription and there was a sign on the door saying that "patient files have been transferred to Long's".
I went over to Long's and asked them to pull up my account, and there it was on their computer, all my prescription information. I was astonished.
No notice was given by Puna Parmacy and no consent was given by their clients to have their medical information passed from one business to another. This is the same thing they did with Pahoa Pharmacy a few years ago. I have two problems with this and I'm really peeved.
1. How can this not be a HIPAA privacy violation? I've tried to contact government agencies, but can't get anyone to call me back about it.
2. Now Long's has a monopoly on client prescriptions in lower Puna unless you want to drive to Hilo. This sort of predatory behavior is upsetting, especially when no patients from the now defunct pharmacies had any say so on where their prescription information went.
Am I the only one upset by all this?

[Kapohocat]

Long's . PUH.

I am upset too.

Maybe you do not get prescriptions at PP often but they did tell us. They also said our prescriptions were being transferred to Long's unless we wanted them transferred some where else. At the time, I wanted to think about it and see how it went.

What I hate is that Long's has them so screwed up that we had to reorder prescription from Doc. They have a list but dont have any of the current ones - she told us there were over 100 of my hubby's from all the years PP had been open.

I hate Long's personally for their pharmacy services. They have absolutely the worst customer service. I cant get texts stopped for someone who got drugs 3 years and used my phone # despite numerous attempts to remove it.

We are looking at the two small pharmacies (Shiigi or Mina) in Hilo to transfer all our records to. (the only hesitation is where the lava is going before we make a change.)

ETA: Rumor has it the employees of PP are thinking of starting up a new small pharmacy in a few months. I told them call us - we'll be there the day you open your doors!

[csgray]

Longs in Pahoa is one of the worst run pharmacies I have ever dealt with.

My father comes and stays with us for 3 or 4 months every winter since my mom died. He has been an insulin dependent diabetic for almost 50 years and the only place that consistently has screwed up his prescription, insurance billing, and even needle size, every single time, is Longs. I have had them be unable to fill antibiotic prescriptions for as long as a week after I was prescribed them for pneumonia, every day we went to pick up the drugs and every day they told me "Sorry, it will be here tomorrow" until I ended up driving into Hilo to get it filled at a different Longs, who told me they had sent the drugs to the Pahoa Longs, who then sent it back twice.

Carol

Every time you feel yourself getting pulled into other people's nonsense, repeat these words: Not my circus, not my monkeys.
Polish Proverb

[missydog1]

Long ago, Long's was a fine pharmacy. I always used them in California, and they were cool when I came here on vacation.
CVS bought them, not Longs any more, name only. Hate CVS.

That sucks about your privacy.

There are a few nice small pharmacies in Hilo, if you decide that.
Not pushing it at all, but I'm very happy using Safeway. They pretty much never screw up, communicate well, and they all know their regulars (meaning once a month, not daily) by name. I'm happy with them.

Target seems to have a well run pharmacy although I haven't had a script there. Walmart is too big and impersonal. When I lived in Kohala I tried KTA and Foodland. KTA was just OK, Foodland was fine.

The little pharmacy at the Ponohawai center where the radiology place is is nice for a small place. They also do compounding if you ever need that.

Kathy

[Puamanakai]

My interest is to know whether what was done was legal under HIPAA regulations. If a doctor cannot send your files to another doctor without your EXPRESS consent, how can a pharmacy. If someone knows where Ai can call to get a straight answer, I'd be very grateful.

[Tink]

From what I understand (wife is a nurse) is that pharmacies can trade "sensitive" information between them (pharmacist to pharmacist)to determine whether or not someone may be "double dipping" their prescription by going to another pharmacy, but the information is not given to the public, or even a counter technician. The pharmacist fills the prescription, the tech only makes the "sale". The "double dipping" method is common for the drug seekers acquiring class 2 narcotics such as OxyContin, Percocet, etc. for personal use, or street sale. This information sharing is to discourage this from happening.
I used to use Longs until CVS took over, and had the same poor service result. Switched over to Safeway, as convenient in my travels about, no problems as of yet.

Edited to add comment about service.
Community begins with Aloha

[allensylves]

We used Target on the mainland, so we continued with them here. We have always had excellent service. We got some shots from Safeway because they were one of only 2 places that stocked them - also excellent service and they give a coupon for 10% off your groceries if you get a shot.

Allen
Finally in HPP

[Obie]

Ah Guys

It's all a part of Obamacare.

All of your medical records are being digitized and any doctor,hospital or pharmacy can access the records that they need to access.

[Wao nahele kane]

The Puna Pharmacy now belongs to CVS and CVS chose to use the Longs location as its new location and name, obviously they have your records. No, there is no HIPPA privacy violation.

[Mendo]

CVS ( aka Longs) sucks. Violates your privacy, lobbies heavy-handedly for monopoly, is a mainland company that doesn't care. Why not "buy local?" There are independent, locally owned pharmacies in Hilo (yes, I know...) that are worthy of our support.