Back to the Start.

It has been just over a week since we got back from the UK.  Our arrival into Melbourne was greeted with heavy rain and thunderstorms and in many ways it feels like we have arrived in Australia for the first time again.

The first and most important job for us when we got back was to acquire a Christmas tree, after all we needed somewhere to put the Christmas presents.  We found a man selling trees that seemed in good shape outside of Bunnings near the Northland shopping centre and so our Christmas tree was sorted.  The only downside was we managed to pick the one day of the year to buy our Christmas tree that Melbourne was suffering an infestation of large green beetles, which hitched a ride with the tree and infested our house and car as well.

Our First Christmas Tree in Australia

The second job of the day was good old house hunting, starting with the auction of the house in Heidelberg West followed by a second visit to a unit in Reservoir.  Although we both really liked the house in Heidelberg West (much to our friends disappointment) we didn't actually place a bid as our provisional pre-approval for a mortgage was just that, provisional, the bank still requiring more proof of Barnadi's income.  The house didn't reach its reserve price, and so one of the estate agents working at the auction came up to check if we were still interested in making an offer.  He explained that we could always put in a 'subject to finance' clause, but as the agents wouldn't give us an indication of what the reserve price would be we left it without placing an offer.  The unit in Reservoir we looked at was one we had looked at before but the auction was set for a date we were in the UK.  It didn't sell at auction so now was back on the market.  Although we spent a long time there considering all the possible confirmation of furniture we could squeeze in, the final decision was that it was just too small for us to be comfortable in.  So we are back to square one in the house hunting stakes.



The Alfred Hospital

On Monday I started my new job at the Alfred, my first two weeks are set aside to the pharmacy departments induction programme.  Weighing up the options for transportation I decided that public transport would probably be more bearable than facing the traffic on Hoddle street every day, and so far the tram ride has been quite pleasant allowing me time to read a book, a simple pleasure I have struggled to find time for in quite a while.  The first thing I noticed since starting work at the Alfred, is the large number of us POMS working there, the second was the relative youth  of the department, although this might be linked to the third thing I noticed, the high turn over of staff, most people I spoke to having been there for less than a year.  That all aside, everyone has been very friendly and welcoming and in the first week I have been out for dinner with a small group of staff as well as being invited to join in a departmental football game (I haven't the heart to tell them how much I hate the game, being English they must just assume I love it).  Most of my induction so far has been spent in the main dispensary, trying to get my head around their computer system iPharmacy and the prescription pricing process.  If you thought pricing of prescriptions was complicated in Australia for community pharmacy, you ain't seen nothing yet.  The Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme (PBS) may be a brilliant system in assuring affordable medication is received by the good people of Australia, but it is the most convoluted and complex system to work with as a pharmacist, making me miss the UK's one price fits all model.  Another problem with the PBS model (other than being overly complicated) is that it prohibits doing one stop dispensing to wards, the use of patients own drugs on the ward and pretty much the whole medicines management service.  I know Australia has developed its own systems so I shouldn't keep comparing it to the UK, but I can't help feeling that PBS will prevent Australia ever releasing the full potential from their pharmacy technicians.  I am only one week in and I still have a lot to learn.