DISCLAIMER: I am NOT an attorney or a medical professional. This post is NOT meant to constitute medical or legal advice. These are merely my personal experiences and opinions as a medical patient of over 25 years and as a disability advocate of 15+ years.  

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If you’re a chronic pain patient with med management:

Beware Kroger/Smith’s/Fred Meyer/QFC/etc.

Yes, ALL Kroger brands.

Not only have I personally experienced discrimination and wrongful termination of ALL of my medication needs through a Kroger brand pharmacy, but I’m seeing and hearing a lot of other chronic pain patients going through the exact same experiences as well. This, regardless of the fact I have been filling the same pain meds through Kroger-brand pharmacies since 2019. 

How do I know it’s discrimination?

1. The issue primarily pertains to pain management medications, but not other controlled substances (CS). 

My partner and I have the same address on file, and they’ve seen us together multiple times, but he hasnt been asked about his address or had any issues getting fills on his CS meds. We are not married and have vastly different last names— the only difference being that I am a chronic pain patient and he is not.

2. Kroger brand pharmacies in my area are being “audited” (straight from the pharmacist’s mouth).

Their goal is to reduce chronic pain patients and subsequently eliminate dispensing medications that patients need in order to function, in an (awful) attempt to reduce whatever findings and repercussions arise from said audits. 

3. The pharmacists at two different Kroger brand pharmacies blatantly lied to my insurance company after I launched two formal complaints.

They claimed that I refused to give them my address on “multiple occasions” and was using “aggressive language”. This is simply untrue. Not only did they ask for my address on only two occasions, but they have had the correct address on file for the entire duration of my being a patient (which I confirmed), and I even repeated the address for them a second time. 

I have recordings of all of my calls with them, videos of the two med pickups after the issues began, and a witness who accompanied me to all pickups. Not once was I ever “aggressive” or refuse to provide a current address. I have abundant evidence that I was anything but “aggressive.” 

Furthermore, my knowing the laws and calmly citing them seems to constitute as “aggressive language.” When you say you’re going to take appropriate action for their extremely inappropriate behavior, you’re labeled as “aggressive.” 

4. Other Kroger brand pharmacies refuse to return calls about non-CS medications (like birth control).

I believe the original pharmacy who was being audited put a falsified note in my chart, alerting other connected brand pharmacies to refuse to fill for me. This has been the case for other patients, too. 

5. Review patterns don’t lie.

I have read countless reviews of Kroger brand pharmacies that have discriminated against and wrongfully terminated other chronic pain patients (which is specifically mentioned in reviews), along with refusing to fill other non-CS medications. The amount of TikTok videos I’ve recently seen of other chronic pain patients experiencing the same issues as us local patients is a crystal clear pattern. 

6.  They are labeling patients who know their patient rights and/or other applicable laws that pharmacists are required to follow, as “aggressive.” 

I cannot stress this enough. It doesn’t matter how calm you are, it doesn’t matter that this knowledge is completely available to every member of the general public, it doesn’t matter if you try to be respectful and reason with them. 

If you know your rights/the laws, and you relay to them that you know your rights/the laws, you will be severely punished. 

That said, I still encourage everyone to be as civil and as calm as possible for your own protection.

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It is my non-medical and non-legal recommendation as a disability advocate and concerned patient that if you are filling any pain medications through any Kroger brand pharmacy you should: 

👉 Find another pharmacy immediately 

(Even just to have on standby in case your care is wrongfully terminated) 

👉 Talk to your prescriber about a plan to advocate for you in the event you experience an issue 

(If they won’t stand up for you and your ongoing needs, that is also an issue). 

👉 Fill your meds as soon as you are able to, and reserve extras if there are any, in case of an emergency (like the inability to get a fill immediately when you are completely out)

Extra tips: 

💡 Prescribers know where they send every patient’s medications, and will have a better idea of which pharmacy/pharmacies are a good alternative option. 

💡 Sometimes smaller, family-owned pharmacies and compounding pharmacies can be a great alternative/option. 

That being said, if you’re a mobility device/wheelchair user like me, you may run into accessibility issues— many of the smaller pharmacies also include gift shops that have displays blocking access to the pharmacy area, or don’t have accessible entrances. 

💡 READ REVIEWS of your current pharmacy on a regular basis to try and get ahead of any potential issues. This is also exceptionally helpful when looking for a new pharmacy, as you won’t be wasting nearly as much of your time. 

💡 If you run into issues, you DO have reporting options, but they’re not always the most reliable or effective. Regardless, a paper trail is extremely helpful. Here are some entities you can report discrimination and failure to care to: 

• Your insurance company or Part D Prescription Plan
• Your state’s pharmaceutical/medical board or board of professional licensing 
• Your state’s Insurance Commissioner 
• The Department of Justice (for ADA violations, including discrimination) + some states have Human Rights Commissions or other anti-discrimination entity 
• The corporate office for whichever retail pharmacy you experienced issue(s) at 

Unfortunately, many of these entities do not take effective action, or any action at all. The goal is to create a paper trail for yourself, and to encourage investigation of pharmacies that are violating laws. The more complaints these enforcement entities receive, the more likely they are to take action. 

💡 Civil legal action is also a possibility in many cases, especially when harm has been caused. Getting an attorney isn’t always the easiest feat, unless the pharmacy has caused significant harm resulting in severe injury, incapacitation, or death. Remember: attorneys are in it for the money and want an easy, slam-dunk case. 

Filing Pro Se, while difficult, is an option— many universities/colleges and court systems have resources and free legal clinics available on how to proceed as a Pro Se Claimant. 

💡 KNOW YOUR RIGHTS! Even if it’s just for your own personal knowledge. Knowledge is power, and that’s why these pharmacies are threatened by people who do know their rights. Just be VERY careful in how you wield your knowledge. 

💡 DOCUMENT EVERYTHING, however it is legally permissible. I personally record all of my phone calls, write detailed notes, and take videos when possible. Knowing the consent laws in your state is extremely helpful (Utah is a one-party consent state regarding audio recordings, and most states allow one-party consent in cases where a crime is occurring or is reasonably expected to occur). 

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I have been filling through Fred Meyer since 2012 when my amazing pharmacist, Mark, moved from Rite Aid to Fred Meyer. He was such an amazing person and professional that we wouldn’t have dreamt of filling through anyone else. The amount of care that he put into his job and getting to know each and every one of his patients was truly incredible. When I moved to Western Washington for better healthcare, I continued filling through Fred Meyer until they consistently caused me to miss my crucial medications. At that point, I switched to a wonderful independent and locally-owned pharmacy for 3 years.

When we were forced to move to Utah, Smith’s (another Kroger brand) was one of the only pharmacies that could get my medications, and it made sense to switch back to their services as they already had my records from the previous 12 years via their connected systems. The pharmacist there was super nice and extremely helpful, but we were forced to move out of the area in January of 2025 due to extreme disability discrimination which significantly impacted our housing situation. So, of course, I transferred to another Smith’s pharmacy.

While this Smith’s Pharmacy wasn’t necessarily good or bad either way, they were mostly reliable in getting my pain medications. If they were out of stock, it had been easy enough to get them filled at the second Smith’s Pharmacy location within the same city. That all changed in October 2025, when Smith’s Pharmacies in my area were going through audits, according to the pharmacist at my nearest/primary location.

All of a sudden, I was being told by the pharmacist that they needed a current address and would not fill medications for patients outside of their “zone” (but never gave a radius or distance), or if the prescriber wasn’t in that zone— my prescriber is located in the next city over, 5 miles away. My address on file has always been current, which I reiterated, but the pharmacist didn’t like that my address on file was 9 miles away in a neighboring city. I don’t use my physical address due to privacy concerns as a DV survivor, and this is the case for every doctor, pharmacy, insurance company, and any other entity I have to supply an address to; I’ve never had an issue with this in the past. Despite the close proximity of my prescribing doctor and my address, and my address on file being correct, I still gave the pharmacist my physical address on a recorded phone call while trying to fill my meds -I am physically located in the same city as the pharmacy, 2.5 miles away- but that still wasn’t enough for them. They effectively terminated my care and refused to fill any of my medications, even my non-controlled substance meds.

I was never actually given a reason (let alone a valid reason) as to why they refused to fill.

Because I had done everything they had asked and they still became hostile even after my physical address more than met whatever their “zone” criteria was, I relayed that I know my rights and the laws, that they were inappropriately denying medical care for no identifiable reason, and I would have to report their misconduct. You would’ve thought I had shot their grandmother by the way they flew off the handle at me.

Naturally, my next step was to try and fill at the other Smith’s Pharmacy location in the same city I physically reside in, which is 8.2 miles away— a whole .8 miles less than my address on file to the closest Smith’s Pharmacy of my physical address. This other Smith’s Pharmacy within the same city has filled these same medications in the past, through the same male pharmacist, with zero concerns or questions asked on at least 3 separate occasions since January 2025.

I was met with nearly immediate hostility and concerns over what the actual issue was. I explained the situation, that I wasn’t given a reason for them to refuse filling, and told the pharmacist that I actually had a recording of the call and I was more than happy to bring the recording in so that he could listen to it. There was no medical, ethical, or professional reason why my main pharmacy refused to fill my medications, but he didn’t care. He refused to listen to my recording, and told me that he, “didn’t feel comfortable,” filling my medications (which I need in order to function), because the other pharmacy refused. It didn’t matter to him that I would be forced to go through withdrawal or face a medical emergency -or even death- as a result of complications from withdrawal in combination with my several chronic illnesses.

It wasn’t until I told him I would be forced to file a formal complaint with The Division of Professional Licensing for refusing to provide care without merit that he finally budged a bit. He demanded to talk to my prescribing doctor, who was out until Tuesday, due to it being weekend and a holiday the following Monday. I had no issue with him talking to my doctor, but reiterated that I was already out of my medication, had missed my morning dose, and was over 16 hours past my last dose (which lasts for approximately 12 hours before excruciating pain comes a gnawing). He told me he would call me back, but refused to give me a timeframe on when I could expect a return call. After some more pressure, he told me it would be, “perhaps sometime today.”

Within a half hour of our call ending, he returned my call and informed me that he would issue me a 4 day fill (which effectively cancels my 30 day prescription), and that he would have to speak with my prescribing doctor before entertaining filling a new script. I picked that prescription up, and braced myself for what may happen next.

On the following Tuesday, I called my pain specialist before they opened and left a brief voicemail outlining the situation. She returned my call and started acting in ways I had never expected from her— she was usually very nice; sweet, even. Now, she was hostile, cutting me off, and telling me she, “doesn’t want to hear it because I have other patients and clinicals to get to.” She told me, “It sounds like they just don’t want you to be a patient of theirs anymore because they don’t like you, and I highly doubt they will fill a new script if I send a new 26 day one.” I said that I wasn’t sure why she would think that, I’ve never had issues in the past with her or either pharmacy, and I was concerned that she was not properly advocating for me. We ended the call with the expectation that she would answer whatever questions the pharmacist may have, but to not get my hopes up.

Well, the pharmacist called me later that morning and informed me that he spoke to my provider, and while he didn’t have a problem filling my new 26 day script, he was “uncomfortable” filling any of my medications going forward due to what happened at my primary Smith’s Pharmacy, and, “this would be [my] last fill through Smith’s.” He still refused to listen to the recording of my call with them to get the full story. When I picked up my meds, the pharmacy technician handed them to me in a bag that was stapled shut and sent me on my way.

Now, I’m not usually one to leave somewhere without double-checking that things were done correctly. Not at the burger joint drive-thru, much less a pharmacy that’s giving me a ton of unnecessary hassle. Turns out that me pulling off to the side to check was a very smart decision, as they shorted me without even saying anything. I had my partner wheel me back up to the counter to ask why the full script was not fulfilled, and the pharmacist came over to tell me, “that’s all we had on-hand.” He blatantly stated he didn’t think it was necessary to inform me, nor did he bother to order more over the weekend, despite knowing that I would likely be back the following Tuesday. I didn’t get nasty, I didn’t swear or cuss, I didn’t yell or raise my voice, I didn’t threaten anyone— I merely stated that I would be reporting this experience to DOPL and other related entities. That, apparently, was enough to label me as “aggressive.”

What he didn’t know, is that I had all of our calls’ audio recorded, and was recording video on my phone when I picked up my meds that day and over the previous Saturday (in my lap, to respect other patients’ privacy). I have ample proof that my behavior was nowhere near what they claim.

The following appointment with my pain specialist resulted in her continuing to act extremely strangely, and ultimately, she discharged me from the practice on her assumption that the pharmacy was right and I was some unhinged, aggressive person. I had never once given her a reason to believe that I was that kind of person, because I’m not. She failed in her duty to advocate for me, and she didn’t like that I called her out on that.

I have no idea what that male pharmacist said to my pain specialist, but it was clearly enough for her to pull a 180 on her treatment and behavior towards me. Nearly a year building up a working relationship as her patient, all relatively great visits, completely and utterly undone by whatever lies the pharmacist spewed forth.

She also refused to listen to me when I stated that Smith’s was the only pharmacy I could find within a 15 mile radius of where I live that was able to get my pain medications or take on new patients with controlled substances. I had called 25 different pharmacies myself before the weekend Smith’s booted me (which I have recordings and written records of), trying to secure a new place to fill at with zero luck. Other Smith’s Pharmacy locations refused to call me back, and that has been the case when needing help securing non-controlled substances almost two months after the whole debacle.

The numerous CVS, Walgreens, and Walmart pharmacies I called couldn’t get the meds through their suppliers. Costco’s pharmacist said their supplier, “hasn’t been able to order any morphine products in quite some time.” The local grocery store chains like Harmon’s and Macey’s couldn’t take on new patients with controlled substance prescriptions, due to their suppliers’ rules about the ratio between controlled substances and non-controlled substances, and they were already maxed out on CS patients. This was also the case for the smaller, locally-owned pharmacies and compounding pharmacies. Every single pharmacist and technician I spoke to outside of Smith’s was extremely empathetic and told me over and over that they wished they could help, and even took the time to brainstorm ideas on what/who to try next.

My hope was that if my provider could help me try to find a pharmacy, maybe -just maybe- I could get my meds. She manages medications for several patients and can see where they’re being sent and fulfilled at, so surely she would have a better idea of where to try. I told her I was more than willing to travel if need be. Plus, there’s a huge difference between a patient calling around to try and find a pharmacy that can fill vs. an actual medical practitioner calling around. These pharmacies often think patients are drug seeking or trying to rob them, whereas a doctor is simply trying to help their patient. And while I didn’t experience any pharmacies mislabeling me as a person with nefarious intentions, there is a difference in optics when an actual doctor asks.

Ultimately, my pain management appointment ended with me not having any kind of plan for ongoing care, and a highly inappropriate medication change that fucked me up for almost a week. CVS was able to fill for a different kind of pain medication, but my pain specialist refused to write for an extended release (ER) version to closer match what I had been on for the last several years. Instead, she wrote for an instant release (IR) med that required me to take it every 3-4 hours, which severely impacted my ability to sleep and function, and the breakthrough pain was excruciating and occurring every 2 hours. The active working time for this med was 2-4 hours, vs 12 hours for my usual med.

Furthermore, my pain specialist, who is (somehow) an actual doctor, didn’t care to follow morphine equivalency guidelines. She completely ignored me when I kept reminding her that I take two pain medications (one ER as primary pain management, one IR for breakthrough pain management), and consequently left me significantly under-medicated. I was absolutely miserable. From my appointment on a Thursday to the following Wednesday, I struggled to focus, I couldn’t sleep, I wasn’t able to do simple math or even care for myself at the most basic levels— the change threw me into a very very bad mental and physical state.

Eventually, my pain specialist spoke to a Walgreens Pharmacy a few cities over and was able to get them to fill that month’s prescriptions for my usual meds, but she still refused to continue my care for, well, seemingly no reason. As glad as I felt that she was finally doing the bare minimum by finding another pharmacy that could fill, I was deeply upset (to myself, I never relayed this to her) that it was at Walgreens and I had no choice but to end my boycott. I implemented said boycott after Walgreens Specialty and Walgreens Retail Pharmacy repeatedly left me without my medications for 2-7 days in a row, damaged my medications by improperly storing them, lost my meds on multiple occasions, and more atrocities that ultimately caused me to re-enter right-sided heart failure. I had planned to take legal action against them, but that has become tricky to start when they’re now the only place outside of Smith’s that can fill my pain med prescriptions.

I requested my records so that I could find a new pain management specialist, and they continued to dig themselves a hole by committing yet another HIPAA violation via sending my records through improperly secure email (they didn’t have the right level of email encryption to be HIPAA compliant).

The week of Thanksgiving, I got a random text from the practice stating that my provider had offered to send electronic prescription fills to Walgreens for December. They were strangely very nice about it, and I think it’s because what I said during my appointment was weighing heavily on my provider’s mind, and she wanted to absolve her guilt before the upcoming holiday.

However, that doesn’t mean I’m not going to file formal complaints about her extremely poor conduct after the pharmacy issues arose, or the other concerning things I’ve observed within the clinic. The whole practice has been very haphazard in the implementation of their own policies (for example: allegedly requiring med counts at every visit, but I was only asked twice in nearly a year; an initial and random drug tests, which they didn’t do until several visits in) and in following state and federal laws. Not to mention, they use blood pressure cuffs that cannot be sanitized, do not change out the paper on the exam tables between patients, extremely thin walls where you can clearly hear everything being discussed with patients, leaving patient profiles and records open and unattended on computers that patients walk by, and more.

Arguably the worst part of that appointment was being asked, “Well, what medication do you think we should switch you to?” I wanted to scream, ‘I don’t fucking know, you’re the specialist/doctor!’ What I actually said was, “Well, we have discussed multiple times at previous visits that these medications have been increasingly difficult to get because of back orders and supply chain issues, which is why I had to switch from ER capsules to ER tablets and add an IR because the tablets don’t work as well, so I thought you would have come up with a plan for this kind of issue.”

Cue her ascribing feelings to me that I did’t have towards her prior to this last visit, and acting like I’m the most dissatisfied and miserable person in the universe. Ma’am, I just want to be able to function, and while I had thought some of her actions (like typos when sending scripts; quantity of 6 instead of 60) and the clinic’s practices were a bit off prior to this appointment, I had never let that be known and had always had pleasant interactions with her. She always asked me about my service dogs, complimented my outfits as I did hers, and was in and out of my appointments without any iota of a hitch.

I doubt she realizes that our call about the pharmacy issues was recorded and that I’ve recorded every appointment, too. Reason being, many of my appointments with her were becoming extremely short, despite her practice billing my insurance carriers for much more time than she actually spent with me. She was in the room a whole 3 minutes for one appointment, and 7 and 5 minutes for other appointments before the pharmacy issues began. She also told me during our call about the pharmacy issues that she, “would have to charge $25 per prescription sent.” That, my friends, is a Medicare Assignment violation, confirmed by the Medicare rep I spoke to, along with her team group chat with other reps.

I could go on and on about these independent pain clinics and how they’re extremely predatory. And I likely will in another post, because the topic really deserves its own dedicated discussion. But for now, I’ll wrap up with this:

Pharmacists are typically some of my favorite medical professionals, and I have a lot of respect for the pharmacy employees who show up and help their patients everyday. Especially those who are forced to work in shit conditions, don’t get adequately paid, and are devastatingly overworked. I know there are massive issues within the pharmaceutical side of medical care that cause burnout and tensions to run high.

But -and it’s a big BUT- that does NOT give pharmacy employees a free pass to treat patients like garbage and cause medical emergencies. An audit of the pharmacy does not magically grant pharmacists the legal authority to cut chronic pain patients off and refuse to fill any prescriptions for any medications that patients often need in order to function and survive, particularly when there is zero medical, ethical, or professional reason to do so.

It is highly problematic that Kroger brand pharmacies are being allowed to act in such a manner, and it raises a lot of questions about the legalities of cutting off chronic pain patients but not patients with other controlled substance prescriptions. As a longtime advocate, it screams disability discrimination. As a patient, it’s been life-threatening and stressful beyond words. As an individual, I’m inclined to take legal action and see what I can do to prevent this from happening to other patients. Unfortunately, Kroger/Smith’s corporate didn’t care because I haven’t yet hit them where it hurts: their corporate coffers. But I have a record of my formal complaint filed with the corporate office and three other entities, I have a solid paper trail, countless pieces of audio evidence, a witness, and a really strong case overall. I hope they’re ready for the next escalation— I know I am.