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Urgent! Time Sensitive Information About Upcoming Decreases in WAC Prices; Action Needed Right Away | Pharmacy Crossroads · Pharmacy Podcast Network

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: We're here to talk about whack decreases. This is, you know,
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: a time sensitive podcast. This stuff happens in the next
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: few weeks and Jay's going to share with us some
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: ways that you can help mitigate is the best word
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: I can come up with some of the issues that
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: the price decreases are going to cause for you.
• 0:20
  Speaker 2: You are listening to the global network of podcasters dedicated
• 0:29
  Speaker 2: to the pharmacy profession. Welcome to the Pharmacy Podcast Network.
• 0:42
  Speaker 3: This is Pharmacy Crossroads with your host, community pharmacy business veteran,
• 0:48
  Speaker 3: the road trip goth Bruce Lealant. Community pharmacy is out
• 0:54
  Speaker 3: of Crossroads. Pharmacy owners across the country are evolving their
• 0:57
  Speaker 3: pharmacy businesses and making a big your impact on their communities.
• 1:02
  Speaker 3: Bruce talks with the most innovative community pharmacy owners, pharmacy
• 1:06
  Speaker 3: industry experts, and people who are passionate about the business
• 1:09
  Speaker 3: of pharmacy and its impact on community healthcare. Pharmacy Crossroads
• 1:14
  Speaker 3: is a member of the Pharmacy Podcast Network. And now
• 1:17
  Speaker 3: here's our host, Bruce Neeland.
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: Well, hello again, everybody, This is Bruce neland bringing you
• 1:24
  Speaker 1: another episode of Pharmacy Crossroads and today, We're doing something
• 1:29
  Speaker 1: different and I think critically important. I have on the
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: line with me today Jay Blackburn, who is the CEO
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: of the Compliant Pharmacy Alliance, one of the largest of
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: the buying groups or group purchasing organizations serving independent pharmacies today.
• 1:51
  Speaker 4: So Jay, say hello.
• 1:52
  Speaker 1: To my listeners and tell us just a little bit
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: about yourself and who the heck is CPA.
• 1:58
  Speaker 5: Is sure, thank you, Bruce. Prior to getting on here,
• 2:02
  Speaker 5: I was thinking about it. It's been a minute since
• 2:04
  Speaker 5: we've last touch base. So yeah, thanks for having me
• 2:07
  Speaker 5: on the Pharmacy Crossroads. I'm glad to participate today. As
• 2:12
  Speaker 5: you mentioned, I'm the CEO the Compliant Pharmacy Alliance. Kind
• 2:17
  Speaker 5: of crazy. I was thinking about. It's going to be
• 2:18
  Speaker 5: my twentieth year with the organization and I've been the
• 2:21
  Speaker 5: CEO since twenty fourteen. I will say this in advance,
• 2:26
  Speaker 5: just let everyone know I'm not a pharmacist, just in
• 2:29
  Speaker 5: case I mispronounced a drug namer two. I like to
• 2:32
  Speaker 5: tell folks I'm industrial engineer with a useless MBA. But
• 2:38
  Speaker 5: you know what you asked was CPA. We're an independent
• 2:40
  Speaker 5: pharmacy buying group with twenty two hundred independently owned and
• 2:45
  Speaker 5: operated member pharmacies. Again it's a member owned cooperative. You know,
• 2:50
  Speaker 5: just a little bit of background. We purchased brand in
• 2:52
  Speaker 5: generic drugs through our primary wholesaleer, Senkora. You know, we
• 2:57
  Speaker 5: provide all levels of service to our members. But well
• 3:01
  Speaker 5: that could take a while and I'm not sure we're
• 3:02
  Speaker 5: here for that today, so we'll go ahead and move on.
• 3:05
  Speaker 1: Yeah, because this is a different podcast for sure, and
• 3:10
  Speaker 1: we're here to talk about whack decreases. This is, you know,
• 3:15
  Speaker 1: a time sensitive podcast. This stuff happens in the next
• 3:19
  Speaker 1: few weeks, and Jay's going to share with us some
• 3:23
  Speaker 1: ways that you can help mitigate is the best word
• 3:26
  Speaker 1: I can come up with some of the issues that
• 3:28
  Speaker 1: these price decreases are going to cause for you. So, Jay,
• 3:32
  Speaker 1: what's going on? What's the core issue here? Why is
• 3:35
  Speaker 1: this important to be talking about right now?
• 3:39
  Speaker 4: Yeah?
• 3:39
  Speaker 5: So great, great, great kickoff question. Right. So, this started
• 3:43
  Speaker 5: a couple of years back when the insulence you know,
• 3:47
  Speaker 5: had whack decreases. Last year you had i'll just say
• 3:51
  Speaker 5: a handful of drugs. But now heading into twenty twenty six,
• 3:55
  Speaker 5: with depending you know, Inflation Reduction Act, the drugs MFP
• 4:00
  Speaker 5: Manufacture fair Price. Each manufacturer's approach is a little bit different, right,
• 4:05
  Speaker 5: so some have chosen to actually go out there and
• 4:09
  Speaker 5: reduce their WHACK values in conjunction with this upcoming implementation
• 4:16
  Speaker 5: of MFP. We could go deep into the weeds on
• 4:19
  Speaker 5: the whys and the so on of why each manufacturers
• 4:22
  Speaker 5: doing what they're doing. But in the in pharmacy, we
• 4:26
  Speaker 5: have to deal with the reality of these upcoming changes
• 4:29
  Speaker 5: and as you said, great word, how to mitigate the
• 4:31
  Speaker 5: risks associated with those changes. So at this point, you know,
• 4:35
  Speaker 5: we don't have all the actual new values, right, but
• 4:40
  Speaker 5: we anticipate based on years past, that we're going to
• 4:43
  Speaker 5: see for these drugs right somewhere in the forty to
• 4:47
  Speaker 5: seventy percent range. Right, So if the whack today's one hundred,
• 4:52
  Speaker 5: we expect post January one, or when the expected changes
• 4:57
  Speaker 5: to take place. We do have one on February one,
• 5:00
  Speaker 5: see those drugs drop from one hundred dollars down to
• 5:02
  Speaker 5: thirty to sixty. Right. So just and yeah, as you said,
• 5:06
  Speaker 5: just a few weeks from now, so a little bit
• 5:08
  Speaker 5: of color there.
• 5:09
  Speaker 4: So I may know enough to be dangerous here.
• 5:13
  Speaker 1: I've been in the wholesale business much of my life,
• 5:15
  Speaker 1: and in the hospital arena, they have this whole process
• 5:19
  Speaker 1: that they call chargebacks, and I'm thinking this looks a
• 5:23
  Speaker 1: little bit like that. So here's what I think a
• 5:26
  Speaker 1: pharmacy needs to be aware of. They have a bottle
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: on their shelf today that costs one hundred dollars and
• 5:33
  Speaker 1: they're going to sell it next month or two months
• 5:36
  Speaker 1: from now for thirty dollars. So they're going to take
• 5:41
  Speaker 1: a hit on that seventy dollars delta.
• 5:44
  Speaker 4: There is a process.
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: For them to get that money back, but that's going
• 5:48
  Speaker 1: to take some time. Is that a fair assessment of
• 5:52
  Speaker 1: what kind of going on here?
• 5:54
  Speaker 5: Yeah? So two things. You know, we'll talk a little
• 5:58
  Speaker 5: bit about, you know, how we're helping our members and
• 6:01
  Speaker 5: are willing to help others. We'll talk maybe how you
• 6:04
  Speaker 5: can go out there and find this list. It's been
• 6:06
  Speaker 5: published in a few spots. We build a nice little
• 6:09
  Speaker 5: diagram of it. But two things can happen if you
• 6:14
  Speaker 5: purchased that product in the window a specific window, right,
• 6:19
  Speaker 5: and there are five different windows, but let's just say
• 6:22
  Speaker 5: on Jardiance the windows from December fourteenth to December twenty seventh.
• 6:27
  Speaker 5: They will provide some sort of credit from the manufacture,
• 6:30
  Speaker 5: probably in March or April. But if you happen to
• 6:34
  Speaker 5: buy the drug in what you described outside of that
• 6:38
  Speaker 5: window and then you dispense it in January, after the
• 6:41
  Speaker 5: whack has gone down, you'll actually lose that seventy dollars
• 6:46
  Speaker 5: and not get a recruitment from the manufacture. Right, So
• 6:49
  Speaker 5: it kind of depends on when you bought the product,
• 6:52
  Speaker 5: But if it's sitting on the shelf before or after
• 6:56
  Speaker 5: that purchase window, you would actually get reimburse seventy dollars less,
• 7:01
  Speaker 5: much like highway robbery we have today with PBMs.
• 7:04
  Speaker 1: But yeah, it seems like a lot of piling onto
• 7:08
  Speaker 1: poor pharmacists who are struggling so hard to take care
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: of people. So what First of all, you mentioned a
• 7:15
  Speaker 1: place to go. Where's this website or landing site that
• 7:19
  Speaker 1: people can go to look at these drugs and see
• 7:22
  Speaker 1: what these windows are?
• 7:23
  Speaker 5: Sure, so out on the CPA website it's called compliant
• 7:29
  Speaker 5: rx dot com. Compliantrx dot com. We've gone ahead and
• 7:34
  Speaker 5: put a right on the landing page orange banner right
• 7:38
  Speaker 5: across the top of the page, and it says time
• 7:41
  Speaker 5: sensitive WHACK decrease Guidance, right and so when you click
• 7:45
  Speaker 5: on that banner, Bruce, it takes you to a comprehensive
• 7:49
  Speaker 5: list of those pending Whack decreases, provides tips and tricks
• 7:53
  Speaker 5: on how to manage your inventory and so on. So
• 7:56
  Speaker 5: if you just go out to our website and you know, so,
• 7:59
  Speaker 5: it's readily available to any independent pharmacy owner.
• 8:03
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and I guess I want to emphasize that. When
• 8:05
  Speaker 1: I spoke with Jay Williams, who's on your team now,
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: you know, he made a big point about saying, hey,
• 8:13
  Speaker 1: I want to do this podcast. I want to let
• 8:15
  Speaker 1: every pharmacy hear about it, and you know, and the
• 8:19
  Speaker 1: information is available to them whether they're a member of
• 8:22
  Speaker 1: your organization or not. And so thank you for doing that.
• 8:26
  Speaker 1: I'm going to step back to this buying window. Sure,
• 8:32
  Speaker 1: what do you suggest a pharmacist does with the product
• 8:36
  Speaker 1: that's on his shelf right now that is going to
• 8:40
  Speaker 1: take a hit after the first of the year.
• 8:43
  Speaker 5: Yeah, so, I mean, you know a couple of things
• 8:45
  Speaker 5: they can do depending on if the you know, if
• 8:48
  Speaker 5: they have full bottles of the product, and whether they're
• 8:51
  Speaker 5: a wholesaler will take back a full bottle return or
• 8:55
  Speaker 5: if it's a partial right so if you have a
• 8:57
  Speaker 5: partial bottle on the shelf, you own it and there's
• 8:59
  Speaker 5: not much you can do with that at that point.
• 9:01
  Speaker 5: But what I would do is, then you know, as
• 9:04
  Speaker 5: many pharmacy owners are going to do, they're going to
• 9:06
  Speaker 5: go out and they're going to look at future fills.
• 9:10
  Speaker 5: Maybe there's opportunities that they were filling prescriptions on a
• 9:13
  Speaker 5: ninety day supply, maybe they'll do a thirty day supply
• 9:16
  Speaker 5: and so on. So that I think where you're hinting
• 9:19
  Speaker 5: at is to use up that excess inventory prior to
• 9:23
  Speaker 5: the price decrease. So that would be product that's on
• 9:26
  Speaker 5: the shelf already today.
• 9:28
  Speaker 1: And where possible, return it to wherever you purchased it,
• 9:32
  Speaker 1: if that's possible, and then purchase it again in another
• 9:35
  Speaker 1: two weeks or another couple of days. I guess if
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: you're pretty clever.
• 9:39
  Speaker 5: Yeah, it's a sophisticated system. And again, depending on your
• 9:45
  Speaker 5: wholesale partner, depending on your returns goods policy, there could
• 9:49
  Speaker 5: be some hoops to jump through. But again I think
• 9:52
  Speaker 5: where you're leading us to is to make sure that
• 9:56
  Speaker 5: you look at this list of whack decrease drugs, familiar
• 10:00
  Speaker 5: rise yourself, make sure your staff is well aware of
• 10:02
  Speaker 5: what the what they are, which ones they are, what
• 10:05
  Speaker 5: the expectations are, so that you're to your point managing
• 10:09
  Speaker 5: day to day.
• 10:12
  Speaker 1: So to frame this again, these are this acronym that
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: we've used or whack decreases in MFP, I think you've used.
• 10:23
  Speaker 1: I think I've seen m d f LP or manufactured
• 10:27
  Speaker 1: discounted list price. Can you rattle off what some of
• 10:31
  Speaker 1: the other names for this are so.
• 10:33
  Speaker 5: That we yeah, there are a bunch of different ways,
• 10:38
  Speaker 5: so you know, internally we reference easy as whack decreases.
• 10:43
  Speaker 5: Others are calling it whack reductions. This is getting intertwined
• 10:48
  Speaker 5: with MFP and the Inflation Reduction Act and whether you're
• 10:54
  Speaker 5: signed up with the facilitator the facilitators to ensure that
• 11:00
  Speaker 5: manufacture difference between what whack is and what you get
• 11:04
  Speaker 5: reimbursed from the PBM at MFP, how you're gonna get
• 11:07
  Speaker 5: the credit that's on the MFP drugs. Half of these
• 11:11
  Speaker 5: whack decreased drugs are actually gonna decrease in whack prior
• 11:16
  Speaker 5: to MFP and they're on the MFP list. So in theory,
• 11:19
  Speaker 5: you have a old whack, a new whack, and then
• 11:22
  Speaker 5: you have MFP and there's different ways to track the credits.
• 11:25
  Speaker 5: It's uh, it's gonna uh, it's a bit of a
• 11:29
  Speaker 5: jumping through hoops day by day, right.
• 11:31
  Speaker 1: So well, and and you know that's that would be
• 11:35
  Speaker 1: simple if that's all it was. But this is only
• 11:38
  Speaker 1: for Medicare. Medicare products, I know we're looking for it
• 11:45
  Speaker 1: to my wife's on eloquists, so you know she's gonna
• 11:49
  Speaker 1: go from several hundred dollars to a few I don't
• 11:54
  Speaker 1: know how much we're gonna save a couple hundred dollars
• 11:56
  Speaker 1: on that one. So we've got some that's some big
• 12:00
  Speaker 1: name expensive medications here.
• 12:03
  Speaker 5: Yeah, So that's funny. I use eloquess in my example.
• 12:07
  Speaker 5: So I'm glad you brought that up right, I wasn't
• 12:09
  Speaker 5: even scripted, but you know, so you got eloquist The
• 12:12
  Speaker 5: whack value on at is six hundred and six dollars, right, so,
• 12:15
  Speaker 5: as you know, that's ten bucks a pill for a
• 12:18
  Speaker 5: sixty count bottle. And we're anticipating that to drop in
• 12:22
  Speaker 5: price a little bit more than fifty percent, but let's
• 12:25
  Speaker 5: just use fifty percent. So it's going to go from
• 12:27
  Speaker 5: six h six down to roughly three hundred dollars a bottle.
• 12:32
  Speaker 5: And you know when I mentioned earlier, you know we
• 12:35
  Speaker 5: have twenty two hundred members. It's roughly six percent of
• 12:39
  Speaker 5: our spend, and that's probably the same spend across all
• 12:42
  Speaker 5: independent pharmacies roughly at five to seven percent. So for
• 12:46
  Speaker 5: our group, we're anticipating a few hundred million dollars in
• 12:51
  Speaker 5: whack value drop. Right, So when we talk about a
• 12:54
  Speaker 5: fifteen day supply in that purchase window and making sure
• 12:57
  Speaker 5: you're buying it, you don't have open bottles. I mean
• 13:00
  Speaker 5: we're talking five, ten, fifteen million dollars at play here.
• 13:04
  Speaker 5: So it is significant specifically on that drug, but you
• 13:10
  Speaker 5: have other drugs on that list, so that like I
• 13:12
  Speaker 5: said earlier, there are seven manufacturers fifteen drug names upwards
• 13:17
  Speaker 5: of about thirty NDCs. You have Eloquest, Jaradiance, Farseiga, Linzes.
• 13:24
  Speaker 5: What's interesting about Linzes that's actually one of the government
• 13:28
  Speaker 5: MFP drugs for twenty twenty seven. They've gone ahead and
• 13:32
  Speaker 5: lowered their whack going into twenty twenty six, so we're
• 13:35
  Speaker 5: already playing with future drugs today, right, So definitely a
• 13:40
  Speaker 5: lot to keep track of, for sure.
• 13:42
  Speaker 1: But for the patient who's on a commercial insurance program,
• 13:49
  Speaker 1: YEP is this all invisible to them. I mean, it
• 13:52
  Speaker 1: doesn't mean anything to those people in the product still
• 13:56
  Speaker 1: goes out into the same cost and reimbursement. Is it
• 13:59
  Speaker 1: as it's been, as it's chewing right now?
• 14:01
  Speaker 4: Right?
• 14:01
  Speaker 5: No, in the UH when they have a whack decrease, right,
• 14:06
  Speaker 5: a little bit different than MFP. When there's a whack
• 14:09
  Speaker 5: decrease that's across the board. So if you're a commercial page,
• 14:15
  Speaker 5: you know, commercial insurance, you're going to see that whack
• 14:18
  Speaker 5: drop from six to oh six down the three hundred
• 14:21
  Speaker 5: if you're on eloquist as well. Right, Okay, Now again
• 14:26
  Speaker 5: where you really talk, Medicare is on the other side
• 14:29
  Speaker 5: for those MFP drugs. So, like I said, this is
• 14:32
  Speaker 5: kind of a perfect storm. You got whack decreases, MFP,
• 14:36
  Speaker 5: and I think more acronyms than we can keep track of, right, So.
• 14:40
  Speaker 1: Well, again to try to be a little bit humorous here,
• 14:45
  Speaker 1: you you did a pretty good job pronouncing those drug
• 14:48
  Speaker 1: names as though, so I'm impressed.
• 14:52
  Speaker 5: On the brand side, not too bad. Sometimes you get
• 14:54
  Speaker 5: into the generic drug names that have you know, seventeen
• 14:57
  Speaker 5: syllables and it's hard for me to pronounce. But on
• 15:00
  Speaker 5: some of the brands, I'm Okay, thanks appreciate that.
• 15:04
  Speaker 1: So the you've got a page on your web page www.
• 15:11
  Speaker 1: I'm so old I can't stop saying the www. Uh
• 15:15
  Speaker 1: compliantarx dot com. I guess the real message here is
• 15:21
  Speaker 1: go look at that, or if you have somebody else
• 15:24
  Speaker 1: coaching you, take a look at what they're doing, because
• 15:28
  Speaker 1: the time to the time to put a plan in.
• 15:30
  Speaker 4: Place is now.
• 15:33
  Speaker 1: Because this is going to hit you if you don't,
• 15:35
  Speaker 1: if you don't move product around and time your purchases, uh,
• 15:40
  Speaker 1: you're gonna get clobbered with with another piece of bad
• 15:45
  Speaker 1: news in your checking account.
• 15:46
  Speaker 5: So to your point, you head out to the website again,
• 15:49
  Speaker 5: click on the orange banner link across the top, and
• 15:53
  Speaker 5: there's a one page. You're out there, you know. You
• 15:56
  Speaker 5: click on it, print ready PDF. You print it out again.
• 16:00
  Speaker 5: Like I said earlier, my recommendation as you print a
• 16:03
  Speaker 5: few copies circulated amongst your staff, leave it on the
• 16:07
  Speaker 5: pharmacy counter, and then maybe check in once or twice
• 16:11
  Speaker 5: between now and the first of the year in case
• 16:13
  Speaker 5: something changes. Right, this doesn't prohibit you know, this is
• 16:17
  Speaker 5: all information that the manufacturers have put out early to
• 16:22
  Speaker 5: give you. You know, we'll call it fair warning, but
• 16:25
  Speaker 5: that doesn't prohibit from somebody from coming up with something
• 16:28
  Speaker 5: new today to counterbalance some government change, and more drugs
• 16:34
  Speaker 5: could hit the list. So we have a date stamp
• 16:36
  Speaker 5: on there as well, so you know that, Hey, it's
• 16:39
  Speaker 5: December ninth today. I go back out on the sixteenth,
• 16:42
  Speaker 5: and if anything's changed, you'll see it.
• 16:45
  Speaker 1: Well, you've got your background blurred on the video that
• 16:49
  Speaker 1: I'm watching, so I can't see the team of staff
• 16:54
  Speaker 1: members with the little caps over their head and their
• 16:57
  Speaker 1: sleeves rolled up who are working on this. But you've
• 17:00
  Speaker 1: got some smart folks on your team who are devoted
• 17:03
  Speaker 1: exclusively to this right now. And I guess the advice
• 17:08
  Speaker 1: is no matter who you are as a pharmacy owner,
• 17:12
  Speaker 1: if you don't have some smart people taking a look
• 17:16
  Speaker 1: at this, i'd advise you to make sure you find
• 17:19
  Speaker 1: somebody and whether it's your wholesaler or your JPO or
• 17:25
  Speaker 1: I don't know that there's an accountant who would have
• 17:27
  Speaker 1: any idea how to handle this, but maybe your pharmacy
• 17:31
  Speaker 1: management system provider will be flagging some stuff and providing
• 17:35
  Speaker 1: some advice. Anybody who's selling to independent pharmacies is worried
• 17:41
  Speaker 1: about this because we need the pharmacies to stay vibrant
• 17:44
  Speaker 1: and viable as well, Jay, anything else you want to
• 17:48
  Speaker 1: share with my listeners. I'm just delighted to have you
• 17:52
  Speaker 1: on my program. And one other pat on the back.
• 17:56
  Speaker 1: I don't know that most people would know it, but
• 17:58
  Speaker 1: you were the guy who got.
• 18:00
  Speaker 4: Me started in this business.
• 18:02
  Speaker 1: I work with the Pharmacy Podcast Network and you were
• 18:06
  Speaker 1: kind enough when I was brand new to take a
• 18:09
  Speaker 1: chance and sponsor some of my podcasts and get me
• 18:13
  Speaker 1: up and going.
• 18:13
  Speaker 4: And I appreciate that.
• 18:15
  Speaker 5: Yeah, you're welcome. I'm glad we did that. So you know,
• 18:19
  Speaker 5: I know you said to keep this short, but if
• 18:21
  Speaker 5: I could have just maybe a couple minutes, absolutely, I
• 18:24
  Speaker 5: think to answer your question. You know, I got our
• 18:27
  Speaker 5: finance team behind me and so on, but I would
• 18:30
  Speaker 5: leave the group the listeners. You're listeners with this, right,
• 18:34
  Speaker 5: So you know, all but one manufacturer has created a
• 18:38
  Speaker 5: unique program. Right, And if you haven't looked at that
• 18:41
  Speaker 5: one pager we keep referencing, it's laid out there. They're
• 18:44
  Speaker 5: going to provide shelf credits and so on. There is
• 18:48
  Speaker 5: one manufacture, AstraZeneca. They're going to be reducing the whack
• 18:52
  Speaker 5: value of Farsiga, right, well, what's interesting about this whack decrease.
• 18:58
  Speaker 5: They're not providing a win window of opportunity for credits, right,
• 19:02
  Speaker 5: It's truly when it changes whack value, it's changing whack value.
• 19:07
  Speaker 5: So the guidance there is this goes back. I think
• 19:10
  Speaker 5: you hit it earlier. This is sort of a day
• 19:12
  Speaker 5: by day purchase drug. Right, you want to buy it
• 19:15
  Speaker 5: and fill it. You don't want to, you know, you
• 19:17
  Speaker 5: kind of want to reduce your on hand quantity almost
• 19:21
  Speaker 5: to you dispense it, you get another one in.
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 19:25
  Speaker 5: So what's interesting there as well is Farsiga is going
• 19:29
  Speaker 5: true multi source generic in April, so it's going to
• 19:33
  Speaker 5: it's on the MFP list. You're getting a whack decrease,
• 19:37
  Speaker 5: and ninety days later into twenty six it's going multi source.
• 19:40
  Speaker 5: We expect ten manufacturers to bring out the generic. So
• 19:45
  Speaker 5: that generic price is gonna we call it a cliff jumper.
• 19:48
  Speaker 5: It's going from one hundred dollars down to five with
• 19:50
  Speaker 5: ten players. Right, So, kind of getting back to it,
• 19:54
  Speaker 5: each of these manufacturers has created a short window hopefully
• 19:58
  Speaker 5: to provide some relief, you know. And again it's you know,
• 20:02
  Speaker 5: based on you know, historical activity. The manufacturers do gather
• 20:09
  Speaker 5: your purchase data from your wholesaler after the first of
• 20:14
  Speaker 5: the year. I think one manufacturer in February, most in March,
• 20:18
  Speaker 5: one in April, they go back and they look at
• 20:21
  Speaker 5: how many units you bought. They take the old whack
• 20:24
  Speaker 5: less than new Whack, and they come up with a value.
• 20:28
  Speaker 5: You know, I know he's not here with us today,
• 20:30
  Speaker 5: but Tom Martin, our CFO, he's probably if I'm saying this,
• 20:33
  Speaker 5: he's shaken already thinking, oh, where's he going with this?
• 20:35
  Speaker 5: But our team puts a lot of time into reconciling,
• 20:41
  Speaker 5: you know, all that purchase history. So we get a
• 20:44
  Speaker 5: daily download from our wholesaler of all the purchases, we
• 20:48
  Speaker 5: accumulate those totals, take the difference old Whack new Whack,
• 20:52
  Speaker 5: and then we have an estimate of what we believe
• 20:54
  Speaker 5: each one of these manufacturers is going to provide in
• 20:57
  Speaker 5: the form of a credit. So again, seven manufacturers, there
• 21:01
  Speaker 5: are four different purchase windows in twenty five, one in
• 21:05
  Speaker 5: twenty six, varying degrees of you know, discount. And what's crazy, Bruce,
• 21:13
  Speaker 5: is that some of these manufacturers use different reference sources
• 21:18
  Speaker 5: to categorize your pharmacy. So not every pharmacy is eligible
• 21:23
  Speaker 5: for these credits. Last year, one of the manufacturers had
• 21:27
  Speaker 5: one hundred and ten of our pharmacies, which are traditionally retail,
• 21:31
  Speaker 5: we have some long term care and specialty pharmacy, but
• 21:34
  Speaker 5: had one hundred and ten of our pharmacies categorized as
• 21:39
  Speaker 5: outpatient pharmacies, which made them ineligible. So when Tom's reconciling
• 21:46
  Speaker 5: all these stores looking at the monies expected to come
• 21:49
  Speaker 5: back through Senkora, one hundred and ten of them came
• 21:52
  Speaker 5: up empty. So nine months later, back and forth with
• 21:56
  Speaker 5: the manufacture, Tom was able to recoup fit fifty five
• 22:00
  Speaker 5: thousand dollars for those one hundred and ten stores. Again,
• 22:05
  Speaker 5: what's fifty five thousand amongst friends? Right? Again, for us,
• 22:09
  Speaker 5: it was only five percent of our membership. But that's
• 22:12
  Speaker 5: what you got to do because depending on the pharmacy,
• 22:15
  Speaker 5: depending on the drug, these dollars are significant. So I
• 22:19
  Speaker 5: think we're your head and is you know, get You
• 22:22
  Speaker 5: got to be diligent. You got to keep that drug
• 22:25
  Speaker 5: list close, keep tight inventory, You got to manage the
• 22:28
  Speaker 5: credit process, you know. I think now I'm thinking out loud.
• 22:34
  Speaker 5: My team gets nervous when I do that. But I
• 22:37
  Speaker 5: think one of the things, Bruce, and you didn't ask
• 22:40
  Speaker 5: me to come on a second time, but maybe there's
• 22:42
  Speaker 5: a chance for me to come back on on one
• 22:45
  Speaker 5: of your other podcasts after the first of the year,
• 22:48
  Speaker 5: where we can go back and look at old Whack
• 22:51
  Speaker 5: new Whack how to track you know, we can probably
• 22:54
  Speaker 5: even put together a one page Excel file that we
• 22:58
  Speaker 5: can make available. We do it automated through our purchase
• 23:02
  Speaker 5: history and change. But you know, there are some pharmacies
• 23:06
  Speaker 5: that are unaffiliated with a buying group that could probably
• 23:10
  Speaker 5: use some extra guidance. So maybe I can come on
• 23:12
  Speaker 5: and talk to you about that after the first of
• 23:15
  Speaker 5: the year if you have.
• 23:16
  Speaker 1: Let's let's uh, let's plan that we'll you know, give
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: me a week or so to look at my podcast schedule,
• 23:23
  Speaker 1: get you a couple of dates.
• 23:25
  Speaker 4: Yeah, Hey, I'm I'm a whole.
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: Lot smarter now than I was, you know, thirty minutes ago,
• 23:34
  Speaker 1: and God bless you for doing this. I'm delighted to
• 23:37
  Speaker 1: have an opportunity to chat with you one on one.
• 23:41
  Speaker 1: You know, I'm I'm an admirer of what you and
• 23:44
  Speaker 1: and your predecessor had built and uh, you know, had
• 23:48
  Speaker 1: an opportunity and in the past to be a vendor
• 23:52
  Speaker 1: that kind of negotiated and worked with CPA, and and
• 23:56
  Speaker 1: the support that you gave us as a supplier was
• 23:59
  Speaker 1: remarkable as well. So ladies and gentlemen, friends and neighbors,
• 24:04
  Speaker 1: we're gonna call this a cut, cut and tape, or
• 24:10
  Speaker 1: whatever the movie words are. And thank Jay for his
• 24:15
  Speaker 1: time as expertise, and invite you all to go to
• 24:20
  Speaker 1: compliantarx dot com and dig into this, or take your
• 24:25
  Speaker 1: smartest tech and challenge him or her to dig into this,
• 24:30
  Speaker 1: because it's happening. Good, bad, or indifferent, it's happening. So thanks.
• 24:35
  Speaker 1: And this is Bruce Neeland signing off with another episode
• 24:40
  Speaker 1: of Pharmacy Crossroads and hey, I guess I got to
• 24:44
  Speaker 1: do it. The happy holidays and prosperous New Year to
• 24:48
  Speaker 1: each of you, and thanks for being listeners to this podcast.
• 24:52
  Speaker 1: It's one of the great joys of my life.
• 24:55
  Speaker 4: So have a good day. Goodbye.
• 24:57
  Speaker 3: Thanks for listening to Pharmacy Crossroads. If you're in interested
• 25:00
  Speaker 3: in talking with Bruce, please contact the show visit Pharmacycrossroads
• 25:04
  Speaker 3: dot com.
• 25:05
  Speaker 5: We look forward to hearing from you.