LAKE ISABELLA, Calif. (KERO) — A mix-up at the Lake Isabella Rite Aid left Hailey Klocke concerned. She's not the only resident who has had problems with the Rite Aid pharmacy
- Hailey Klocke picked up what she thought was antibiotics for her daughters ear infection. When she checked the bag, she was given another persons prescription for Trazodone.
- The closure of The Drug Store in Kernville over the summer has further limited pharmacy options for KRV residents.
- Rite Aid filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in October of 2023. Since then the company has closed over 520 stores. Currently, there are no plans to close the Lake Isabella Rite Aid.
BROADCAST TRANSCRIPT:
“So I went to pick up a prescription for my daughter’s ear infection and then upon picking it up they gave me some other man’s prescription for a really strong sleep medication,” said Hailey Klocke.
Hailey Klocke, a Kern River Valley resident, said the mix-up could have had serious consequences.
“Kind of just shocked and kind of scared because if I had not read that and just given it to her it would’ve been really bad.”
She said the receipt in the bag had the correct information for her daughters medication, an antibiotic to treat an ear infection, but the medicine inside was trazodone, a medication used to treat depression and insomnia.
She noticed the error when she was leaving Rite-Aid and went back to the pharmacy.
“They looked at the receipt and couldn't figure out how something that was not her medication could have even been in the bag,” Klocke recalled
She was shook.
“There was zero explanation as to why that would have happened. Zero,” Klocke said, “It was a little odd and concerning because there are a lot of steps you are supposed to take before you hand out a medication to someone from a pharmacy.”
Klocke’s is not alone with her frustration: The drug store in Kernville closed over the summer, transferring their customers automatically to the Rite Aid pharmacy.
Since then, multiple residents have reached out to 23ABC with a range of issues, some residents saying since the switch they've had trouble filling their prescriptions.
“I’ve called the corporate number three times and every time they just try to tell me wait three days, we’ll escalate the situation, we’ll have somebody reach out, they haven’t,” Klocke said.
23ABC reached out to Rite Aid regarding this incident and received this email back:
“We recently learned there was an isolated prescription error at our Lake Isabella store, and we immediately corrected the issue. We maintain the highest level of pharmacy policies and protocols across our stores to safeguard against errors, and we take this matter very seriously. We are confident our stringent preventive measures will ensure this doesn’t happen again.”
As for Klocke, she's still waiting for an answer after filling out an online complaint form.
“I did that on [October] 7th and still haven't heard back from that either.”
Klocke says she most likely will stop using the pharmacy - and hopes measures are taken to ensure this doesn’t happen to anyone else.
“Even just an apology, or acknowledging that they made a mistake and then maybe doing more training to prevent these types of mistakes from happening.”
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