Independent pharmacy owners experience a multitude of challenges that make it difficult to boost profitability and grow their business. Competitors like CVS and PillPack are making it harder to compete for patients, and PBMs are making it difficult to stay profitable.
To ensure a healthy community pharmacy industry, it is imperative that pharmacy owners maximize their profitability – which is why RxSafe recently hosted a webinar that focused on the untapped profitability that many independent pharmacy owners are not utilizing.
To watch the full webinar, click the video above.
Explaining the Value to Patients
Some independent pharmacies offer adherence solutions, such as pouch packaging, to help improve patient health. One of the biggest challenges is getting patients to understand the value of the packaging to get them to switch.
“There's so many studies and statistics, but I think what resonates with patients is stories,” says Lisa Faast, experienced pharmacist and pharmacy educator. “Every pharmacist has a story of where something went wrong because somebody missed medication; it's always best to use your own experience.”
Thomas McDowell, owner of McDowell’s Pharmacy in North Carolina, offers strip packaging to help his patients improve their adherence.
“We started having conversations with our sync patients, since we were already keeping up with those patients on a monthly basis,” says McDowell. “We just took it one step further by having that conversation with patients taking multiple medications as well.”
"We explain how it simplifies their life, how it relieves a burden off of them or a loved one. We keep it simple.”
Focusing on Existing Patients
"A lot of existing patients that are getting their prescriptions in vials are not adherent to begin with, so those are ideal candidates to convert to adherence packaging,” says McDowell.
There are many patients that miss multiple medications each year, which means fewer fills for the pharmacy. Each prescription that is missed means less income for the pharmacy and lower adherence for the patient.
“Collectively targeting those outliers that are not adherent and getting them to a point of being over 80% adherent, from a revenue standpoint, is definitely an improvement,” says McDowell.
If you would like to watch the full webinar, please click above. For information regarding the RapidPakRx, please visit our product page or call a strip packaging expert at (877) 797-2332.
