A national pharmacist shortage is hitting home in Maine.

Across the state, the prescription counters at more than a dozen drugstores have been closed for a day or so, with little notice, because there were no licensed druggists available to oversee less-skilled pharmacy technicians.

More than a dozen customers in need of drugs have complained to the state about going to their pharmacies only to find the prescription area shuttered.

“We continue to find that the lack of coverage is sporadic. It happens at different times of the week and different times of day,” said Anne L. Head, director of the state’s Office of Licensing and Registration, which oversees the Board of Pharmacy.

The state is developing new rules that would require stores to notify regulators of temporary closures and to make sure customers get more timely postings. Pharmacies also will be required to follow guidelines to ensure customers can get their prescriptions filled elsewhere.

Last week, pharmacy inspector Gregory Cameron said drugstores in Fort Kent, Machias and Kennebunk were among those closing temporarily that the state knew about. Right now, the Board of Pharmacy is dependent on customers reporting closures because the stores aren’t required to tell. The Bangor Daily News has been told of stores in Bangor and Hampden closing temporarily recently.

On Friday, the Hampden Rite Aid posted reduced weekend hours on a handwritten piece of paper in the store window.

There are 280 retail pharmacies in Maine and 1,217 pharmacists, according to Head. Only in the last nine months has the state begun to hear about closures in Maine, even though the national shortage is a few years old, she said.

The shortage also is affecting hospitals. It took Mayo Regional Hospital in Dover-Foxcroft more than a year to replace a pharmacist who left to take a job in a retail drugstore.

Bill Miller, the owner of Miller Drug, the largest independent pharmacy in Maine, spoke about the shortage Thursday while driving to Bangor Mental Health Institute to fill in at its short-staffed pharmacy.

Miller said that while his drugstore always has backed up BMHI, the hospital has had trouble recruiting a second pharmacist. Low state pay doesn’t make it easier to find such a pharmacist today, he said.

With 12 pharmacists, Miller said his store is up to staff, but he said the shortages elsewhere are pronounced.

“The shortage is primarily in the chain stores,” he said.

Chains have added problems because workers have no ownership interest and therefore are more likely to call in sick or take a day off. But where pharmacies have just one pharmacist-owner, a lot keep short hours to begin with, he added.

One idea suggested in Augusta was that in areas where chains have a number of retail stores, they pick one central location and rotate pharmacists to it to ensure at least one drug counter is always open, he said.

Nationally there have been reports of the pharmacist shortage delaying chains’ expansion plans.

Head, however, contends the shortages are hitting all pharmacies in Maine equally, not just chains.

Rite Aid’s problems with shortages have been fewer this year than last year because the chain intentionally has closed stores and pursued slower expansion than others, said Sarah Datz, a spokeswoman.

She said Maine is particularly difficult to staff because it’s harder to recruit for the state’s many rural stores.

Datz said with prescription sales expected to grow 75 percent in the next five years, the number of new drugstores needing pharmacists is bound to increase.

Miller’s drugstore is open seven days a week and there’s often a line at the counter. He sees a silver lining in the shortage. “We’ve picked up a lot of business from everybody,” he said.

The shortage also has had an impact on the pocketbooks of pharmacists, as employers scramble to attract the highly trained individuals. In 1998, pharmacists in New England were paid well below the national average. In the next two years, pay increased more than 25 percent to about $63,315 a year, slightly ahead of national rates, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

While 2000 data is the latest available, Miller estimates that an experienced pharmacist in Maine makes more than $80,000 a year today. And with the nation’s pharmacy schools having just switched from a five-year to six-year program, which means there won’t be a graduating class this year, the pay is likely to go higher.

According to a 2000 study by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, the current shortage forced pharmacists to do a wider variety of work, including filling more prescriptions. It has been exacerbated by growing competition among retail pharmacies building new stores and expanding hours.

The study found that the shortage reduces the amount of time druggists have to discuss prescriptions with customers. It also increases stress due to longer hours, compounding the potential for errors.

And the shortage has prompted pharmacy-school faculty to take jobs in drugstores, making it difficult to increase class sizes, the study found.

The idea of having a Maine pharmacy school has been discussed at the Board of Pharmacy, said Head. Other states have looked to have a local school to ease pressures, but Head is unsure if this would help in Maine.

Kevin Clancy of Island Pharmacy in Stonington said a pharmacy school in Maine would be helpful. Right now, Mainers who go out of state to get training frequently take higher-paying jobs elsewhere. In the Boston area, pharmacies are offering $2,000 to $8,000 signing bonuses, said Chris Sampson, a spokesman for the Massachusetts College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences.

Clancy expects the additional school time it takes to get a degree beginning this year will have a chilling effect.

He sees the numbers of prescriptions being written on the rise. He estimates there’s been a 10 percent increase in each of the last couple of years.

When he needs to have someone cover for him, he’s turned to friendly Bangor pharmacists in the past. Getting that help is harder today. And though he’d love to have part-time help, that doesn’t look realistic in today’s environment either, he said.