Retail Pharmacy - Balancing COVID and Mom Life with Dr. Linda Dumas

About our guest: Linda Dumas, PharmD

Education: Massachusetts College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences Class of 2010

-Pharmacy Manager, Publix

-Assistant Pharmacy Professor at University of Florida

(newly hired and starting in the Fall 2020, teaching via Zoom)

-10 years as a pharmacist

-Founder of Apothea (founded in June 2020)

-New small business owner

Linda Dumas, PharmD

-Instagram: apothea.co

-Website: apothea.co

Host - Hillary Blackburn, PharmD, MBA

www.pharmacyadvisory.com

https://www.linkedin.com/in/hillary-blackburn-67a92421/

@talktoyourpharmacist for Instagram and Facebook

@HillBlackburn Twitter

More Topics to expect from Linda in the episode:

-Retail Pharmacist changes during Covid-19:

-wearing masks, Plexiglass at consultation window, curbside prescription deliveries

-Managing a team thru Covid, the constant policy changes and procedures.

-being proactive rather than reactive. We got a timer in the pharmacy and had it going off every 30 minutes as a reminder to go wash our hands.

-Being a working mom & pharmacist during Covid:

-My son’s school closed during Covid and we had a couple of really hard weeks as parents, both trying to work.

-We took turns being home with William (our son) and the fact that I work 12-hour days made that easier to manage. My husband took off the days I was working to be home.

-My son would come and visit me in the pharmacy from time to time, and explaining to him that he wasn’t able to go into the grocery store was hard. It’s not that he wasn’t allowed, but we both felt like it was an unnecessary risk of exposure.

-Doing Zoom meetings with my son’s 4 year old class

Questions I was asked during Covid:

-Vaccinations; we have a program called Florida Shots and we had a lot of patients catch up on their immunizations during Covid.

-While giving immunizations we were required to wear a face mask as well as a face shield.

-A lot of patients asked about supplements or vitamins they could take to improve their immunity: Zinc, Elderberry, Vitamin C were big topics I was asked about

-A lot of people inquired about getting their flu shot, we didn’t have any as flu season had passed but people who put off their shot were looking for it.

-DIY hand sanitizer.