Stye in the eye, priced sky high for this guy

I go to the doctor, he says “No big deal, take this for seven days.” The pharmacist says come back in an hour. When I come back, the lady says “We haven’t started, come back in five minutes.” When I come back the second time, they say “$15 please.” I ask how much the eye drops were, almost $100? (I have 80 percent coverage). She says, “Nope, the total is $22, but your insurance doesn’t pay for the $15 dispensing fee.” I said “$15 for five minutes, that is $180 per hour, of course the insurance company won’t pay an insane rate like that.” She frowns and says, “Please wait for the pharmacist, she wants to instruct you on proper use of the eye drops.” The pharmacist comes over and starts giving me a big spiel about how important it is to wash my hands in order to prevent the spread of pink eye…yep. I heard it correctly, she said pink eye. I said, “Do I have the right eye drops, because I only have a stye?” She says “Oh, in that case, the risk of spreading it is almost none, and yes you have the correct eye drops.” I asked, “instead of spending $22 on this stuff, why don’t I buy some OTC eye drops for pink eye?” She says “It is too late to get a refund on this prescription but yes, the OTC eye drops would have worked, too.” At this point, I left before I strangled someone. —Please Someone Check My Back Door, I Think I’ve Been Violated

This article appears in Aug 9-15, 2012.