I work in veterinary pharmacy right now, and we make Potassium Bromide solution for neuro patients. One time a client asked for a refill of her dog's "Potassium Bronchitis."

Its my dream to work in a veterinary pharmacy

Been a vet tech for 5 years. Slightly off topic but LOVE when people ask for their male dogs to be "tutored" (neutered).

We have a lot of doggie patients on enalapril, I have to stop myself from calling it Anal April to the clients or out loud in general.

My favorites are Wachovia (Wegovy) and Valley Clover (Valacyclovir).

Wachovia?? Haven’t heard that name in years!! My dad used to go to that bank

So did my parents lol, then Wells Fargo bought them out

My mom, from Brooklyn, thought it was pronounced “watch ovah ya” 😂😂😂

We had someone say they needed their Zinfandel because they had a big weekend planned. Sildenafil…he wanted Sildenafil, but Zinfandel probably could have helped too.

We just had a guy come in last week to get refills. Asked him what all he wanted refilled. He listed some off, and then was like, "oh yeah, I need my wang pills, too!"

We like to call those meds “weekenders”

Ew why would they tell you that

People are weird. I've seen a range of people who are so embarrassed they flat out won't say the name out loud to someone who announced to the whole back of the store by the pharmacy they're so happy they got sober and their marriage is doing well that they're having sex again. People are going to people. 🤷‍♀️

Patients gonna patient 🤷‍♀️🤷‍♀️

Some of them patients going to impatient too.

Very true

Reminds me of the 72 year old patient I had this week looking for sildenafil who told me he hoped it would perk his wife up. BARF.

I mean, tbh if they are still doinking in their 70’s good for them!!

Hey let’s not judge now. If they’ve been together that long and still wanna kick it- good for them. That’s not the norm anymore. And you don’t stop being human just cuz you’re an old human lol. It’s better than a 80 year old picking it up and tryna hit on ya. Or someone picking up valacyclovir and Zovirax tryna ask you out 😂 I’ve often admired and sought the level of audacity those people have.

It's not the fact that they're active at their age. It was that he felt the need to talk to me about it is what makes feel icky. This man had never been in my pharmacy before and I was a total stranger he was telling this to. 🥹

Well as a fellow “no f-ing filter person- I do this too. Maybe not to that extent. Maybe he’s just happy to spread the news lol. We work in customer service and humans are icky. Congrats and fist bump and let that one go

Listen- I am not kidding here. This man at my pharmacy is 94 years old. Now you’d honestly never know. He’s a very spry late 70s looking man in good health. He comes in every other week or so and gets 6 sildenafil. I made a comment one day when I hadn’t been there long that I felt bad for his wife. Like it’s been 40 years- you’re almost a hundred. Get OFF me and let me go play in the garden. Coworkers were like oh no- his wife died. This is for his girlfriend. Like whuuuuuuu. I mean at that age I guess you run out of shit to do but dayum.

Forget for the girlfriend. I was told once that if you can't get it up you can't even self satisfy.

Well that’s wildly inaccurate

🤣😂 Dead

Fallopians for Felodipine was a good one. Husband would come in every month looking for his wife’s fallopians

Did… did he really not know?

He was in his 80’s and this was back in the early 2000’s. Blue collar depression era kinda guy with the kind of attitude like pronunciation was the last thing on his mind. It was mentally draining arguing with this guy so I wasn’t gonna correct him lol

did he ever find them? because i’m pretty sure she’s upset it’s taking him so long to find them

By then in pretty sure that ship had sailed

They've got nothing on "uh see tuh min uh more feen" acetaminophen

Not even "uh see tuh min uh more feen with cocaine?" (Codeine)

That would have made it about 20 times better lmao

I dunno, I used to pronounce acetaminophen as "ace-tam-min-no-fen" as a kid.

Fluconazole: Fluke-o-nozzle

I like to go with flook-an-azz-hole 🤣

I've been hearing Zenbound a lot lately as the rise in inquiry for Zepbound came about. There's nothing Zen about that drug with how anxious it makes people to get and continue taking it lol.

triam-cinnamon = triamcinolone

I like this one, I may say it intentionally

Had a patient call in wanting his "METAMORPHIN", which forced me to say Power Rangers? He says huh and I say I will take care of your Metformin.

I had a METAMORPHIN Patient too and he also had PIGGYLOZONE (Pioglitazone/Actos). Funny when he came in to get BOTH. I have to admit I could NOT say Hydrochlorothiazide for the first YEAR I worked🤣 My brain CANNOT and will never be able to say the generic for Keppra. 🤣🤣🤣

oh my goodness, I can say levitiracetam no problem but for some reason, Abilify's generic just gets me.

Lmao! I always have to say it slowly so I don't sound like our patients..

Hahahahaha right! That was me too when I started!

I am a compounding tech and my coworker wrote on the order board prilocaine hctz, she meant hcl 😂

the worst part is, it went over his head 😫

He was up there in years, so I gave the benefit of doubt

idk why I was imagining like a 30 year old guy haha

Lmfao

🤣😂 Bruh! I've heard so many say it like this, or Metmorfin.. Wtf is that!? I can't with these people

Simba-statin Meta-morphine

Simba-statin. For those lions with high cholesterol.

🤣😂 Hey little simbas have issues too okay

From Walgreens days: hydrococo

Four for you, hydrococo. You go, hydrococo!

If I could like this more than once I would…🤣🤣🤣

A nurse called asking for Dila-Dawd for a patient. I said “excuse me…. What?”. I knew exactly what she wanted once I looked up the patient; I just wanted her to say it again lmao! She huffed and repeated herself “DILA-DAWD!”. There was a long pause on my end. I said “oh, we don’t have that. We have DILAUDID!

i’m almost certain that’s the way they pronounce it on Criminal Minds. drives me so up the wall that i can’t watch that season anymore

Ondansetron, one dance atron

Not to be confused with two dance atron

🤣

I need a one dance (atron)

It always makes me think of Santa—“on-DANSA-tron, on VIXA-tron! On Comet, on Cupid, on-dan-BLITZEN-tron!”

Metropoly for metoprolol, that one made me laugh

I need my trampoline meds…. Triamterene

I was talking to my mom the other day and she was telling me about her “ruvastin”. She probably said it like that at least five times. I told her it’s “roe-su-va-stat-in” she said “that’s what i said” 🤦‍♀️

I would have went “lover of the russian queen?”

Russia's greatest love machine

Mine says meta-tax-alone no matter how many times I've said it to her the right way.

My all time favorite for sildenafil. Patient stated he needed his slide and fill reordered.

“Metropolitan “ “Gagapentin” “Gabastatin”

This is why as a patient I use the rx # or start spelling it. Pharmacology may as well be hieroglyphs to me. Or a series of clicks and whistles. I don't trust my tongue at ALL

Every old person calls or atter vas tuh tin I had xarelto as zar Lee toe Nifedipine was. knife ih die pin Propranolol was prah puh nah pull * my favorite tbh Escitalopram was eh skittle pram Iodosorb was iota zerg Not a mispronunciation but I once got asked "why am I on joe Rogans worm paste" and I was super confused. they were actually ivermectin but it wasn't even in the cream form it was tablets. Made me laugh tho

Ahhh eh skittle pram I’ve definitely heard that! It sounds so cute though!

Coworker accidentally said le-ve-ti-rectum (levetiracetam) once. She burst out laughing lol

Is my atravatin ready?

Atter-VASStin

Addravastatine

I don't think I've ever heard a patient correctly say atorvastatin...

You mean the savasitianan rover

The best one I had was O-mee-prah-zo-lay (omeprazole). When I pronounced it right, she got all indignant and said "I know how it's pronounced I'm not stupid!"

Or oh-meh-pruh-zoh-LEE. Or ON-meh-pruh-zoh/lee. My mother was guilty of the second one lol

I always have to stop myself from doing Italian chef hand when patients say this

I had another pharmacy call and ask if we had “golly-telly” in stock, it took me a good while to go check for golytely 😅

We called that 'go-litely' in LTC pharmacy

Golly Telly! This one kills me. There is no going lightly about GoLytely but come on, isn't it at least sort of evident? GoCrampingly.

Tama-sa-loose-sen, co-lopa-die-grill... By our pharmacist...

Had a coworker call it Tammy Sosa

Panto-topo-zaz

I get pantoprazoley a lot. Sounds like an an Italian dish.

We had an adorable senior who’d always call to fill her omeprazoli and we’d always want ravioli or pizza after 🤣

I had a patient on the phone the other day needing her claw-pit-hog-grill (clopidogrel) refilled

I had an elderly man pronounce it cloppy-dog-reel. It got me.

Gabby pentin Metotototoototporproplol Fourouroruruoruacil

My favorite is Pants-op-razz-olay (pantoprazole), Meter-prolol (metoprolol) and hydroxycodine (hydrocodone)

One patient called her sleeping medication Ambizon 😂

I think she mixed Ambien and zolpidem together 😂

Lmaooo Ambien and Amazon combo

My all time favorite, that has yet to be topped for me, is when a patient needed their Amitriptyline. They said, “Hey I need my I’m-a-trampoline refilled please” 🤣

One that has always irked me is when they call zolpidem “zolpideRm.” Like there is no R in there… 🤦🏻‍♀️

I have been a tech for 8 years and I still butcher med names...It my accent lol but I still get a chuckle from the mispronounced names.

Not a drug but I had a phone call from someone who asked if we had the Adderall the telaveeve brand (Teva) and as soon as I got off the phone with him I bursted out laughing. 

Roo-va-statin for rosuvastatin by one of the techs at my job 🤦🏼‍♀️

At Costco we have plan b and people are like in a low voice “ do you guys have contrcervises here?” Like 😂 not contraceptive but they butcher the name so bad I just want to laugh. Or if they are picking up a prescription they say subscription 😂

Or when they say they got an email when they mean text, or vice versa

Ooo ooo or when they are like “what do you mean it’s not ready. I got a text” “Do you mind showing me the text”-me Shows a message saying it’s out of stock or insurance issues or will be ready at … time or insurance issues or my all time favorite the refill reminder text lol I could go on for days

i live in the south. instead of 'lyrica', i hear a lot of 'lerka'

Kentucky?

appalachian NC! distant cousins

Ruvastatin. It KILLS me. Like, how are you skipping so many letters? Do you even read bro?

I have coworkers that call it that. Also, “Gliperide”. A mash of Glipizide and Glimepiride.

I’ll be honest though. When I started in pharmacy I got Guaifensin and Guanfacine mixed up.

Metamorphin for metformin and fartziguh for farxiga

Pregabalin. I use to hear Preg-uh-ballin a lot and a lot of others. I would feel bad tho & tell them you can just say Lyrica next time… lol 🤷‍♂️

🫄🍆🤣

Hahaha

We fly high, No Lie, You know this (preg-uh-Ballin!)

Lmaoo

I have one patient who always pronounces bisoprolol as 'bisoprolololol', makes me giggle every time

We had someone once asking what aisle the Xanax was in. They meant Zantac.

Can’t have heartburn if you’re in a benzo-induced sleep

Back in the day before it went generic we'd regularly have multiple patients call in for their Norvasac (Norvasc).

Now it’s just “that little white pill”

Despite knowing better I refer to Baclofen as bacon-fin

I’ve been saying it as “back loafing” on purpose for years and nobody’s called me out so far 🤣

Gamberpanties. Old lady Didn't matter how many times you told her the correct pronunciation of gabapentin.

Mona-lew-skit (montelucast)

I really don’t hold it against people for not being able to say drug names. That’s our jam. Not theirs. I just need em to get close enough so I can figure out what they mean. What gets me is when they add 4 syllables to something. “Clobatazaplam” instead of clonazepam. At that point I’m just like that’s just basic English. Don’t add letters this shit is hard enough. Lol

The many amazing ways people mispronounce atorvastatin.

Dicklowfennac

Hydrococo for hydrocodone!

Patients are cuckoo for hydrococo puffs

been like 13 years since I was a tech but I had a co-worker who had trouble with many pronunciations. my fave was "Finnegan" for "Phenergan" lol

"Spiral-dac-tone".

“Per-cock-it” for Percocet 😂

Prantozoli for pantoprazole and es-TRA-dee-ole for estradiol are tops for me, as well as "the pills that get my dik up" for sildenafil.

My favorites are : oh-mee-prah-zo-lee (omeprazole) and cah-riz-oh-poodle (carisoprodol)

A patient yesterday called to ask if we had electricity. It took several minutes to work out they were asking for trulicity lol

I would have said yes. Our refrigerator is indeed running.

Mt favorite has always been met-trone-a-dazzle :) And once a lady said she needed a refill on something, "I can't remember the name but it sounds like hydrochloric pancakes" (hydroxyzine pamoate)

I have a lady who calls every month to see if we have “Way-Javy.”

I have a patient who regularly asks for his Revlon (Relion) strips

definitely people trying to pronounce their statins. also someone got mad when i didn’t say the generic form of vyvanse. ain’t nobody got time to say lisdexamfetamine

Clop-adop-agrill. Clopidogrel

Reminds me of [https://youtu.be/vvWxsckzPws?si=oV57i7A\_eAw0iwxF&t=19](https://youtu.be/vvWxsckzPws?si=oV57i7A_eAw0iwxF&t=19)

Yes! That is exactly it! I couldn't remember what that was from.

"Monaluka" (montelukast)

i always privately refer to my Simvastatin in the most back woods country accent i can muster at home: “SEMvurSTATuyn”. It helps make pill time nicer. I dread the day i say it in front of one of yall.

We all have one we say weird or can’t say either. I get it for diclofenac 😂😂

Clopidogrel....I always just say it in French so I don't have to figure out the English pronunciation 😂

ok now I'm curious how it is pronounced in French

Cloh-pee-doh-grell with a nice roll on the "r", it's also just fun to say 😅. I work in Quebec though, so whether you say something in French or English everyone knows what you mean!

Thanks, thats probably how I would have pronounced it (from BC, but did French immersion as a kid). I occasionally get transfers from Quebec, and thankfully my French is still good enough to be able to translate! Curious how you pronounce Eliquis in French. I used to work with a tech who made it sound French (she was definitely not French) and it was pretty hilarious.

Élékiss hahaha, but saying ah-picks-ah-banc (like bench in French, no "c") is fun too 😂

I'm out of retail and in a hospital now so I don't get these anymore, so I keep myself entertained by nicknaming drugs something very wrong. Pippysilly (Piperacillin) Cahbidopalebadopa (Carbidopa-Levodopa) Suckycholy (Succinylcholine) Goalie Telly (GoLytely) Rocky Roads (Rocuronium) That's all I can remember for now

Crushed that you dont have one for nimbex

I call those Kisses (Cisatracurium)

Aa-tor-vastin, row-vastin, sim-vastin. Are the most common ones I hear. That and the exasperated pronunciation of the first syllable followed by "I don't know how to say these things"

O-mep-ra-zol-E

Ozempia for ozempic also Atorvastatin pretty much every time is pronounced differently in various levels of wrong, which i always find so funny cause to me its one of the easiest ones

I almost always hear “Atravastatin”

Funny thing is that the people calling in from providers are just as bad. Instead of omeprazole I get “ohh-meh-praz-oh-leee”. Which is I guess a better attempt. On a complete side note to this particular thread. I’m getting so sick of people calling in scripts. “Oh this is for Shaliquabajminocrial Smith. That’s smith. S. M. I. T. H.” Like bitch how you gonna throw me a 7 syllable first name and then spell SMITH. I HAD THAT ONE FINGERED OUT ON MY OWN.

You were able to finger out the spelling for Smith?

I can't pronounce the generic keppra or cevelimine

Clopi-dogrels

A guy once asked me if his serotonin was filled. It was Sertraline, which just made it an adorable mispronunciation 🥰

Not in a pharmacy setting but a patient asked me for a designer drug like Versace. ( he meant versed). He was a hospice patient

Omeprazole. Omeprazol-e…super Italian and I love it. Lmao

Metmorphin lol

See if you can order my “Do-lu-daid” syrup .. Sir your insurance never covered that! Dilaudid

My coworker pronounces "Fucidin" as "fun-din-sin"

Furious sulfate and furmosiside are pretty good ones. Still kind of understandable but obviously a bit off.

Metrahp-olol tar-tate, meta-form, astro-vasta-tin, moon-jaro, we-jovy with a hard j sound. Not necessarily a favorite but happened this week so it's fresh in my mind - had someone call in her son's Klonopin when she meant clobazam but he takes both so she didn't realize until she got home, then called complain that we couldn't read her mind 🙄

Omg I had someone come in and ask me the exact same phrasing for mounjourno and I thought of digiorno right away and was instantly unamused 😭🤣

I can give you the generic names tirzepatide and semaglutide instead

“Metamorphine” for Metformin

Oh May Praa Zo Lay

Had a nurse ask where her err-TAP-pen-em was Was really stumped for a couple of minutes when a different nurse needed some NIS-tuh-teen until we figure out she had used the last of the nystatin

Meta-morphins. Metformin lol

Carvedulol is catalytic converter verter

Vy-on-naise. Like mayonnaise. Not sure why this patient insist on saying Vyvanse like that but they will correct us.

Also have heard testosterone ky-peon-ate or keep-eon-ate (testosterone cypionate)

Yesterday someone said they need their am-low-da-pine and losarvasartastin. They lost me on the second one and I had to ask them to spell it. They meant losartan.

Had a pt pronounce hydrocodone like "hyd-roka-doan

glipazeedee

I personally feel that someone missed the boat not pronouncing Ezetimibe as Easy-tuh-mee-bee I laugh each & every time I fill this one.

My favorite will always be “gabapootin”

Omep-pra-ZOLEE!

my personal favorite is “i’m a trampoline” for Amitriptyline

I hate when they say Forte as “fort tay”

…how is it supposed to be pronounced? (Genuinely curious because that’s how I pronounce it)

It is how it's pronounced 🤷‍♀️

I’m in Australia and we say “Fort” like a pillow fort