Latest / Pharmacy Podcast Network / The Value of Community: A Conversation with the 2025 Community Leadership Award Finalists Episode One | Cardinal Health™ Counter Talk™ Podca

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The Value of Community: A Conversation with the 2025 Community Leadership Award Finalists Episode One | Cardinal Health™ Counter Talk™ Podca · Pharmacy Podcast Network

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Speaker 1: You are listening to the global network of podcasters dedicated
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Speaker 2: The testimonials appearing in this podcast reflect individual experiences, and
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Speaker 2: future of pharmacy. Join me your host Jason colorI, for
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Speaker 2: and services. You can subscribe to the Cardinal Health counter
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Speaker 2: Talk podcast on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and wherever you listen
1:08
Speaker 2: to your favorite podcasts. Hello everyone, and welcome back to
1:11
Speaker 2: the Cardinal Health counter Talk podcast. I am your host,
1:13
Speaker 2: Jason colorI, and today that's right, we are living among legends.
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Speaker 3: That's right.
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Speaker 4: I'm not speaking in hyperbole today on the podcast, we
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Speaker 4: have with us two twenty twenty five Cardinal Health Community
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Speaker 4: Leadership Award nominees to share all the amazing things they
1:27
Speaker 4: have done to be pillars of healthcare and small businesses
1:29
Speaker 4: in their respective communities.
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Speaker 3: We also dive into what they.
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Speaker 4: Have done advocating for independent pharmacies from a state and
1:35
Speaker 4: national level.
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Speaker 3: Listeners, Please welcome our twenty twenty.
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Speaker 4: Five Community Leadership nominees, Pharmacists Can Tie of nine to
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Speaker 4: eight six Pharmacy and Jesse Stout of Table Rock Pharmacy
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Speaker 4: and Compounding.
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Speaker 3: Welcome to the show. Esteem guests, Thank you, Thank you
1:49
Speaker 3: for having us.
1:50
Speaker 5: Hi Jason, thank you for having us.
1:52
Speaker 3: Nice to see you guys again.
1:53
Speaker 4: I know we're a couple months removed outside of Denver,
1:57
Speaker 4: but how is your community leadership? How was your whole
2:01
Speaker 4: experience and how was the how did everything happen for
2:03
Speaker 4: you at RBC? How how was that whole experience and
2:06
Speaker 4: how did your teams and mainly your families react to
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Speaker 4: all of it.
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Speaker 6: So I didn't have quite as big of a team
2:12
Speaker 6: there as Canada, me and my husband and are two kids,
2:17
Speaker 6: but luckily my parents got to come out as well.
2:20
Speaker 6: It was exciting because they actually started our pharmacy, So
2:23
Speaker 6: it was really cool and special to be able to
2:26
Speaker 6: have them there. I mean, it was a huge honor
2:30
Speaker 6: just to be one just nominated for the award, so
2:34
Speaker 6: we think are Jason our sales rep for that, but
2:38
Speaker 6: then to make a finalist with two very impressive pharmacy
2:44
Speaker 6: owners from across the country was was a huge, huge honor.
2:49
Speaker 6: So it was just it was really neat to be
2:51
Speaker 6: there and to meet them and just you know, share
2:55
Speaker 6: that experience with other pharmacy leaders.
2:58
Speaker 3: How about you, Ken, you had a few people with you,
3:00
Speaker 3: just a few a.
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Speaker 5: Few well, I mean, to be honest, we always have
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Speaker 5: a pretty good showing to RBC, so we average about
3:08
Speaker 5: forty to fifty individuals to attend that event, and so
3:11
Speaker 5: obviously this year was a little extra special because they
3:14
Speaker 5: also got to come out and celebrate the nomination, which
3:16
Speaker 5: again was hugely humbled and honored to receive, along with
3:21
Speaker 5: of course Jesse and Mike, so you know, and in
3:25
Speaker 5: all honesty, it was a surprise and it was fun
3:28
Speaker 5: because typically I'll have my family out as well, so
3:31
Speaker 5: just like a little extra you know, kind of motivation
3:33
Speaker 5: for them to come out and have fun with the
3:35
Speaker 5: rest of the group for sure.
3:37
Speaker 4: So Ken, while we start with you real quick, I
3:40
Speaker 4: just want to kind of get into about your journey
3:43
Speaker 4: into the pharmacy profession. While you chose to become an
3:45
Speaker 4: independent pharmacy owner and your specific community that you serve,
3:50
Speaker 4: your story was incredible. We obviously worked on the entire
3:54
Speaker 4: almost documentary film like content that we had created for
3:59
Speaker 4: peace people to see at RBC, and I think it
4:02
Speaker 4: hit a lot of people, you know, in the heartstrings
4:05
Speaker 4: and also was very motivating, you know, the same with
4:07
Speaker 4: all of you. So Ken, why don't you start there?
4:11
Speaker 4: I just want to know what your journey to the
4:13
Speaker 4: pharmacy profession was.
4:16
Speaker 5: You know that the journey was was I'm sure like
4:18
Speaker 5: many I you know, of course, you know, very new
4:22
Speaker 5: to the healthcare industry, and so, like most had experienced
4:27
Speaker 5: working in the local pharmacy, fell in love with it
4:29
Speaker 5: and decided that that was something I was going to do.
4:31
Speaker 5: As a matter of fact, going into pharmacy school, I
4:32
Speaker 5: didn't really know what anything else but independent community pharmacy,
4:37
Speaker 5: you know, would be like, because that's where I had
4:40
Speaker 5: worked in the summers and make deliveries and et cetera.
4:42
Speaker 5: So that was really the goal. So after coming out,
4:46
Speaker 5: did a quick residency and community and pretty much a
4:49
Speaker 5: year or two later, after I saved up as much
4:51
Speaker 5: money as humanly possible and a couple of noodles every day,
4:54
Speaker 5: I was able to muster enough money to start my
4:57
Speaker 5: first location in small town now Moni, California. That sprung
5:02
Speaker 5: into sort of in a few years, a franchise model,
5:06
Speaker 5: which we then opened more stores, and I guess it's
5:09
Speaker 5: about nineteen and a half years now. We have about
5:11
Speaker 5: fifty locations throughout southern California and Nevada. So it's been
5:15
Speaker 5: a fun journey, and I think the more important thing
5:18
Speaker 5: for me was that I was able to utilize this
5:20
Speaker 5: platform to allow other young you know, pharmacists that want
5:26
Speaker 5: to have a career in entrepreneurship and in community be
5:29
Speaker 5: able to utilize that as a platform to also become
5:32
Speaker 5: junior partners and be a part of this fun journey
5:35
Speaker 5: with me.
5:36
Speaker 4: Jesse, what about you, I know you mentioned your pharmacist,
5:39
Speaker 4: your parents kind of starting the pharmacy and you kind
5:42
Speaker 4: of following those footsteps.
5:43
Speaker 3: Was that something always kind.
5:45
Speaker 4: Of ingrained in you, or as you grew up and
5:48
Speaker 4: got a little bit older, you pretty much knew that's
5:51
Speaker 4: what you wanted to.
5:52
Speaker 6: Do, so actually the opposite. So I did, you know,
5:57
Speaker 6: I worked in the pharmacy as a teenager, you know,
6:00
Speaker 6: on the cash register and that kind of thing. But
6:04
Speaker 6: I always said I was not going to go to
6:06
Speaker 6: pharmacy school, and I was not going to definitely wasn't
6:11
Speaker 6: going to move back to my hometown and it definitely
6:14
Speaker 6: wasn't going to ever take over my parents' pharmacy. But
6:19
Speaker 6: you know, I went to college. I went to UNC
6:20
Speaker 6: Chapel Hill and was undecided major for quite some time,
6:24
Speaker 6: and it ended up just you know, applying pharmacy school
6:28
Speaker 6: because I was running out of time. I was a junior,
6:30
Speaker 6: didn't know what else I was going to do. So
6:33
Speaker 6: when I got in, I was like, well, maybe I'll
6:36
Speaker 6: just give it a go. But felt convinced I was
6:39
Speaker 6: going to do something kind of non traditional. Did a
6:43
Speaker 6: rotation in London and in DC at APHA and really
6:46
Speaker 6: liked those non traditional options as far as pharmacy goes.
6:52
Speaker 6: And then I actually had a preceptor in my fourth
6:56
Speaker 6: year of pharmacy school and he convinced me to a residency.
7:00
Speaker 6: It's actually in patient hospital residency, so I did that
7:05
Speaker 6: and ultimately kept in touch with that preceptor. He found
7:12
Speaker 6: a new job at a company called Premiere in Charlotte,
7:15
Speaker 6: and he actually had an opening and so I actually,
7:18
Speaker 6: straight out of residency, went there and did what I
7:21
Speaker 6: always thought I was going to do, non traditional and
7:25
Speaker 6: worked with a pharmacy software product, traveled all around trained
7:29
Speaker 6: hospital pharmacists on how to use it, and did really
7:33
Speaker 6: appreciate that opportunity and enjoyed that job. Worked there for many,
7:36
Speaker 6: many years. But fast forward, you know, we had a
7:40
Speaker 6: couple of kids. We were traveling back to my hometown,
7:43
Speaker 6: which is Morganton because we have a lot of mountains, lakes, hiking,
7:47
Speaker 6: that kind of thing. And around the same time, my
7:50
Speaker 6: parents were looking to retire. So they never pushed me
7:54
Speaker 6: into it at all, but they were just like, hey,
7:57
Speaker 6: you know, if you want to take over the pharmacy,
8:00
Speaker 6: this is your chance, because you know we're we're ready
8:03
Speaker 6: to step down and you know, enjoy our retirement. And
8:06
Speaker 6: so it was a huge change and a huge leap
8:11
Speaker 6: of faith. But we decided to move back to Morington,
8:14
Speaker 6: even though I said I never would, and I decided
8:19
Speaker 6: to start working in my parents' pharmacy. And I was
8:22
Speaker 6: so nervous that first day because I hadn't been a
8:25
Speaker 6: practicing pharmacist, you know, since ever. Really I felt like
8:31
Speaker 6: I didn't really remember anything, didn't know anything. But I
8:35
Speaker 6: loved it, like I love the patient interaction. I loved
8:40
Speaker 6: you know, working you know, with the coworkers. And so
8:45
Speaker 6: fast forward, my husband and I decided that we'd give
8:49
Speaker 6: it a go. So worked here for all of a
8:53
Speaker 6: little over a year, I think, and decided to buy
8:57
Speaker 6: it in March of twenty nineteen. So okay, that's how
9:02
Speaker 6: we got here.
9:03
Speaker 3: Well, the two of you.
9:05
Speaker 4: So you guys obviously took a couple of different paths,
9:07
Speaker 4: but I think the one thing we took from obviously
9:11
Speaker 4: with you guys being nominees, was how much you've impacted
9:15
Speaker 4: your communities that you serve and how you've really built
9:19
Speaker 4: that trust within your community. And I think you two
9:22
Speaker 4: go about it in different ways. You offer different services,
9:25
Speaker 4: but you still have that core belief in, you know,
9:28
Speaker 4: building up your community and obviously caring for the people
9:30
Speaker 4: within your community.
9:32
Speaker 3: Ken, I'll get your take on this.
9:34
Speaker 4: You've done a lot of different things within your pharmacy
9:37
Speaker 4: and within the community. You have a very unique clientele
9:41
Speaker 4: and the people you serve, get into a little bit
9:44
Speaker 4: about some of the things that you've done to build
9:46
Speaker 4: up the trust within your community.
9:49
Speaker 5: Well, I mean definitely, you know, can you open my
9:53
Speaker 5: own pharmacy? Community was definitely top of mind. So you know,
9:57
Speaker 5: even in the name itself ninety six, it really is
10:00
Speaker 5: you know, live in south of California, we're very kind
10:03
Speaker 5: of multicultural, very diverse community, and so the word ninety
10:07
Speaker 5: six it self was partially because of the fact that
10:10
Speaker 5: most of our CRE members don't speak or read English.
10:14
Speaker 5: So having a number then whether you speak Spanish or
10:17
Speaker 5: you speak Chinese or Korean or Vietnamese or Russian or Armenian,
10:22
Speaker 5: it was irrelevant. You can probably understand a number nine
10:26
Speaker 5: eighty six and you could see it in your own language,
10:29
Speaker 5: and so that was part of the reason why we
10:30
Speaker 5: did it. And of course we do tailor to elderly
10:33
Speaker 5: so you know, they don't have the best cognition sometimes
10:36
Speaker 5: and the ability to remember, so three numbers was supposedly
10:39
Speaker 5: the easiest way for you to remember something, or three
10:41
Speaker 5: digits or three letters, and so that's kind of partially
10:44
Speaker 5: why also we selected the name that we did. Besides
10:47
Speaker 5: you know, the meaning of.
10:48
Speaker 3: Course, Yeah, that's pretty pretty brilliant.
10:51
Speaker 5: Well thank you. I need to think the guy who
10:53
Speaker 5: helped us do the branding, No, but definitely was. I
10:57
Speaker 5: thought it was a great idea, and so on that
11:01
Speaker 5: front that that's really what it's about for us as
11:03
Speaker 5: a company, is really serving that community a lot more
11:06
Speaker 5: underserved area. So you know, all our pharmacies anyone they
11:11
Speaker 5: go to technically would be you know, specifically designed for
11:14
Speaker 5: that community. So they're in this Hispanic area would be
11:17
Speaker 5: ninety six Faramacia and then everyone there speak Spanish. Everything
11:20
Speaker 5: there is like you walked into Mexico or Spain or whatnot,
11:23
Speaker 5: and so it's tailor's specific to those communities. And so
11:26
Speaker 5: in doing so, we were able to then of course
11:30
Speaker 5: eventually venture into the homeless population, which is unfortunately a
11:33
Speaker 5: big problem in southern California. So we had a homeless
11:36
Speaker 5: outreach in our nonprofit where we actually had boots on
11:39
Speaker 5: the ground. Basically every day, they're walk in with like
11:41
Speaker 5: a little tote, something rollly tote, and they walk through
11:45
Speaker 5: the streets and camp the camps and the various areas
11:50
Speaker 5: where you see the homeless and tents and stuff, and
11:52
Speaker 5: they'll just basically provide services under full protocol. Sometimes we
11:56
Speaker 5: have patients with scabies, you know, patients obviously, vaccinations. The
12:00
Speaker 5: list goes on and on in terms of different types
12:02
Speaker 5: of services that we rendered to them, and it's basically
12:05
Speaker 5: a daily thing. So we've done this for the last
12:06
Speaker 5: few years. And of course during the height of COVID,
12:09
Speaker 5: we provided imanization vaccination services to the community and we
12:14
Speaker 5: were actually rewarded by the CEC Manny Cohen. She came
12:17
Speaker 5: out and we're gaining a service award because I supposed
12:20
Speaker 5: that we were the highest vaccinator for COVID and in
12:27
Speaker 5: terms of the counties, the alle County, which I'm assum
12:28
Speaker 5: it's probably one of the largest counties in the country.
12:30
Speaker 5: So it was really a huge honor and I actually
12:32
Speaker 5: got to vaccinate her to promote vaccinations and so it
12:35
Speaker 5: was one of the coolest things times and everything. So yeah,
12:39
Speaker 5: I mean, we try to do whatever we can because
12:41
Speaker 5: it isn't very important for us to do whatever we can.
12:46
Speaker 5: And I've always said that it's not about us telling
12:49
Speaker 5: the patients what we want to do to serve them,
12:52
Speaker 5: is about us them telling what they need. And we
12:54
Speaker 5: just walked up to their level in terms of what
12:57
Speaker 5: they want and what they need as a community. So
13:00
Speaker 5: that's always been sort of our goal that'll be done
13:03
Speaker 5: for the last you know, as ever since I've opened
13:06
Speaker 5: my store, my first location, so we try to stay
13:09
Speaker 5: true to that.
13:10
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, that's amazing. What about you, Jesse.
13:14
Speaker 6: So I was fortunate, you know, that my parents had
13:16
Speaker 6: started the store. They started in nineteen ninety, so they
13:19
Speaker 6: had already done an excellent job of, you know, building
13:22
Speaker 6: up trust in the community, and so you know, we
13:27
Speaker 6: just had to kind of fill those shoes and continue
13:29
Speaker 6: to build upon it. And COVID, while it was extremely
13:34
Speaker 6: hard for everyone, you know, it also brought a lot
13:37
Speaker 6: of new opportunities for pharmacy. And during that you know,
13:42
Speaker 6: as you know, there was so much misinformation out there,
13:45
Speaker 6: and so quite frequently during COVID, we would make like
13:49
Speaker 6: short little reels and put them up on our social
13:51
Speaker 6: media accounts to give our patients and their community truthful information.
13:57
Speaker 6: And so they knew that they could come to our
14:01
Speaker 6: sites and find out the factual information. And so our
14:05
Speaker 6: patients really appreciated that. And we you know, also provide
14:09
Speaker 6: an information to providers in our area too a frequently
14:12
Speaker 6: with like fax them updates like COVID related updates and
14:15
Speaker 6: then evolved to other things as well. But you know,
14:19
Speaker 6: having the trust of the providers then you know, is
14:22
Speaker 6: relayed onto their patients as well. And so I think
14:28
Speaker 6: just having kind of that entire community trust has been important.
14:34
Speaker 6: And I've also built a relationship with a couple of
14:37
Speaker 6: local reporters, one for our local paper, and see he
14:41
Speaker 6: will frequently reach out to me for input on various
14:44
Speaker 6: things like, you know, how are the tariff's going to
14:47
Speaker 6: impact drug pricing? And he's done really great at covering
14:50
Speaker 6: PBM issues and so a lot of people in our
14:53
Speaker 6: community still get the paper printed paper and so and
14:58
Speaker 6: I do too, and I love it. So you know,
15:01
Speaker 6: our community member, like our patients will come in all
15:04
Speaker 6: the time and you know they're like, oh, great article
15:06
Speaker 6: in the paper. You know, I really appreciated learning about
15:10
Speaker 6: X y Z whatever it was. And so really just
15:13
Speaker 6: being a source of information I think has helped to
15:17
Speaker 6: build build trust in our community.
15:19
Speaker 3: That's a good one. I think I've heard that one yet,
15:20
Speaker 3: of people reaching out.
15:21
Speaker 4: To local reporters and media outlets in order to get
15:25
Speaker 4: the word out, especially what's going on within each and
15:27
Speaker 4: every community. Ken I'll go back to you on this
15:30
Speaker 4: and and Jesse, obviously I want you to answer this
15:33
Speaker 4: because you know, we asked this question a lot, basically
15:36
Speaker 4: like what does it mean to you to be an
15:38
Speaker 4: independent pharmacist? Why does it feel it's important to you?
15:40
Speaker 4: And I I feel like we get a lot of
15:43
Speaker 4: the you know, the usual answers where you know, obviously pharmacists,
15:48
Speaker 4: it's kind of ingraining you to want to help people
15:51
Speaker 4: and to serve and to be that pillar of healthcare
15:55
Speaker 4: within your communities. But I think I want to just
15:58
Speaker 4: kind of share that question a little bit and ask
16:02
Speaker 4: you what does it mean to be an independent pharmacist
16:05
Speaker 4: in your community now like in today's times versus versus
16:10
Speaker 4: then what you're able to provide now and what you're
16:14
Speaker 4: able to do in your communities? What does it mean
16:16
Speaker 4: to and what you've done as well, because you guys
16:19
Speaker 4: have done so much, What does it mean to be
16:21
Speaker 4: an independent pharmacyt pharmacist now in today's times in your communities?
16:27
Speaker 3: And can I'll start with you.
16:29
Speaker 5: I'll be honest, I think the the healthcare industry is
16:34
Speaker 5: extremely difficult to navigate in today's world, probably much more
16:38
Speaker 5: difficult than it's ever been. Very confusing, and quite honestly,
16:41
Speaker 5: for me, it's we're just an extension of that where
16:45
Speaker 5: we can serve as you know, the layman body that
16:48
Speaker 5: they can go to, the friend that they can respond
16:51
Speaker 5: to and talk to about all those issues. I always
16:54
Speaker 5: tell my team that you know, just because you're a
16:57
Speaker 5: pharmacist and you can tell the side effects and what
17:00
Speaker 5: the drugs are doing for a patient, it's not that
17:03
Speaker 5: big a deal because I can go and chat GPT
17:05
Speaker 5: and get that pretty quickly. It's the relationship that we
17:09
Speaker 5: build and understanding of where they come from and what
17:11
Speaker 5: their needs are that really differentiate us from anyone else.
17:15
Speaker 5: So when they come to us, they're not just asking
17:17
Speaker 5: about I mean, if a patient's been on a tenel
17:19
Speaker 5: al for the last twenty years, do you think they
17:21
Speaker 5: need to know about the side effects? And then they
17:23
Speaker 5: probably know it better than I do, to be very
17:25
Speaker 5: frank with you, So what am I really doing? I mean,
17:28
Speaker 5: I'm really there because I'm a resource. Right they have
17:31
Speaker 5: questions about other healthcare situations or their their loss in
17:35
Speaker 5: the system where they know what's going on their insurances
17:38
Speaker 5: or they can't you get a hold of their provider
17:40
Speaker 5: and we serve is that liaison, that triage. So I
17:44
Speaker 5: think we're more of a resource, you know, healthcare resource center,
17:48
Speaker 5: somewhere they can go to and access information quickly and readily.
17:54
Speaker 5: I think those are the things where we really prove
17:56
Speaker 5: our value. And I think that anyone that's been in
17:59
Speaker 5: an independent pharmacy knows that the relationships that we built
18:02
Speaker 5: with our patients go far beyond that of medications, and
18:06
Speaker 5: these folks look at us as friends, as extensions of
18:08
Speaker 5: their family. I'll share a quick story. My patient of
18:12
Speaker 5: mine is actually I just went into the pharmacy maybe
18:14
Speaker 5: about a month ago, one of my original locations, and
18:17
Speaker 5: I was talking to my staff and they gave me
18:18
Speaker 5: a picture of this magazine I happened to be featured
18:20
Speaker 5: and almost about eighteen years ago when I first started
18:23
Speaker 5: my pharmacy, and there's a little note that this says
18:25
Speaker 5: thank you. And I was like, what is this? Oh
18:27
Speaker 5: my god, this is from like ancient history, for God's sake,
18:31
Speaker 5: And I looked, God awful. It's like I looked like
18:33
Speaker 5: I was like ten years old. Anyways, I told him that, hey,
18:36
Speaker 5: this is disgusting. I just put this away. Go no, no, no,
18:38
Speaker 5: this is one when our patient XYZ and I was like,
18:40
Speaker 5: oh my god, how's he doing. I haven't seen him forever.
18:43
Speaker 5: And he goes, yeah, he just passed away. I said,
18:45
Speaker 5: oh my god, why is this here. So the sun
18:47
Speaker 5: was cleaning out the house and before you know, they
18:49
Speaker 5: were throwing things out, and then they haven't had this
18:51
Speaker 5: magazine and they brought it back to give to our
18:54
Speaker 5: staff to give it to me. And I was like, well,
18:56
Speaker 5: why did he bring this back? You could just toss
18:58
Speaker 5: it or whatever. He goes, no, this has been on
18:59
Speaker 5: my According to the patient son, this has been on
19:03
Speaker 5: his count coffee table for the last eighteen years.
19:07
Speaker 3: Wow.
19:08
Speaker 5: Every time anyone would come over, family, friends and everything,
19:11
Speaker 5: he would boast about the fact that, hey, look this
19:13
Speaker 5: is my pharmacist and he's famous. He's on a magazine.
19:19
Speaker 5: And then he would tell everybody and he was so
19:21
Speaker 5: proud of it, and then everything until the day he passed.
19:25
Speaker 5: So even though their kids didn't really know me, they
19:29
Speaker 5: knew who I was, and they were, you know, somehow
19:32
Speaker 5: connected to me in that way because of their parents.
19:34
Speaker 5: And then so when he passed away, they basically said, hey,
19:37
Speaker 5: I never had a chance to really thank you or
19:39
Speaker 5: even express how I felt because we were so busy
19:42
Speaker 5: going about our business, we didn't really have time to
19:44
Speaker 5: take care of our parents. But apparently you're the extension
19:46
Speaker 5: that and took care of them for us. And so
19:48
Speaker 5: for that, I really, you know, want to thank you.
19:50
Speaker 5: I couldn't honestly throw this away. I really had to
19:53
Speaker 5: come back here. And even though you know, it wasn't much,
19:56
Speaker 5: it was just a little thank you, you know, yellow
19:57
Speaker 5: stickt note. It meant a lot because when I was
20:00
Speaker 5: personally connected to that patient. But second of all, to
20:02
Speaker 5: know that the impact that I had, you know, I
20:04
Speaker 5: didn't really think too much about it was so significant,
20:07
Speaker 5: you know, And so that's really what this is all about.
20:11
Speaker 4: Yeah, you said a couple of different things that I
20:13
Speaker 4: love there, especially when it comes to I think the
20:16
Speaker 4: missing word there is trust because, as you lead it
20:19
Speaker 4: to earlier, you could go on you know, chat, GPT
20:23
Speaker 4: and look up an answer, you can do a mail
20:26
Speaker 4: order or whatever it may be, but you lose that trust.
20:29
Speaker 4: It's a trusted source which you guys provide, especially now.
20:33
Speaker 4: I think that's a great point, Ken, because the healthcare
20:36
Speaker 4: landscape is so overly complicated. You guys are that sounding
20:40
Speaker 4: board for that trust that they need. Jesse, I'll add
20:44
Speaker 4: the same question to you. How do you feel about
20:47
Speaker 4: being a pharmacist in today's times?
20:50
Speaker 6: Yeah, so I completely agree with everything Ken said about,
20:53
Speaker 6: you know, the patient trust and that kind of thing.
20:55
Speaker 6: And one, you know, the thing I really try to
20:58
Speaker 6: do with our pharmacy students is they take through, is
21:01
Speaker 6: just teach them how much you can do as a
21:03
Speaker 6: community pharmacist, because a lot of times it kind of
21:07
Speaker 6: gets a bad rap, you know, like you know, you
21:09
Speaker 6: just put pills on a bottle, that kind of thing.
21:11
Speaker 6: But we can do so much more. And the patients,
21:15
Speaker 6: you know everything that Ken said, they trust us, they
21:18
Speaker 6: rely on us. You know, we help them put on
21:22
Speaker 6: their destcom meters for free. But also we can provide
21:26
Speaker 6: so many services, especially in North Carolina. You know, we
21:28
Speaker 6: can now prescribe birth control for patients. We can give
21:32
Speaker 6: long acting injectibles for patients. We just got to build
21:36
Speaker 6: passed earlier this year where we can test and treat
21:39
Speaker 6: for flu. So we've you know, throughout COVID, we did
21:43
Speaker 6: the COVID testing. We actually do flu testing as well.
21:46
Speaker 6: But now starting October one, we'll be able to write
21:48
Speaker 6: scripts for like TAMA flu and so it's just exciting
21:53
Speaker 6: because pharmacists can now do so much more. I mean,
21:57
Speaker 6: it is state dependent, but a lot of states are
22:00
Speaker 6: broadening scope of practice for community pharmacies and that's important
22:05
Speaker 6: for a number of reasons, you know, primary care shortage.
22:08
Speaker 6: We also get patients in and out quick. It's also
22:11
Speaker 6: a lot cheaper to come to us for a COVID
22:14
Speaker 6: flu test than it is to go to urgent care.
22:17
Speaker 6: And patients they just book an appointment online and call us.
22:20
Speaker 6: When they get here, we run out the back door
22:22
Speaker 6: and swab them. They're in and out in twenty minutes,
22:24
Speaker 6: you know, with their results. So I just think it's
22:28
Speaker 6: you know, while it is extremely challenging with all of
22:32
Speaker 6: the PBM issues and roadblocks, we do have a lot
22:37
Speaker 6: of opportunities that we didn't you know, maybe five or
22:41
Speaker 6: ten years ago.
22:43
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's yeah, that's great.
22:44
Speaker 4: And actually, Jesse, I want to stay with you because
22:46
Speaker 4: this leads me into both of you and can do
22:49
Speaker 4: a lot of things outside of the walls of your pharmacy.
22:53
Speaker 4: The impact in your community that goes further, Jesse. You
22:55
Speaker 4: had mentioned some pharmacy students that come, you know, through
22:58
Speaker 4: your doors that you have help out and talk to
23:01
Speaker 4: tell us about, you know, your role as a community
23:04
Speaker 4: health educator. I think it's a big part of what
23:06
Speaker 4: you do specifically at your pharmacy. Tell us about the
23:09
Speaker 4: level of health literacy in your area, how your efforts
23:12
Speaker 4: have impacted patients their knowledge and the ability to manage
23:16
Speaker 4: their own health.
23:17
Speaker 6: Yeah, so health literacy ranges widely here. You know. I
23:24
Speaker 6: actually found out one of our patients last week can't
23:27
Speaker 6: read and so that's his wife always took care of
23:31
Speaker 6: him and his medications, and she unfortunately passed away. So
23:34
Speaker 6: it's just navigating things like that to help him. You know,
23:38
Speaker 6: if you can't read his prescription bottles, how is he
23:40
Speaker 6: going to know what's what and what to take when?
23:44
Speaker 6: So for him, putting stuff in or is meds and
23:46
Speaker 6: adherence packaging works out. And you know, we also, you know,
23:53
Speaker 6: things that are complicated are like Medicare coverage. So my
23:57
Speaker 6: husband actually became a licensed Medicare agent year so that
24:01
Speaker 6: he can sit down with our Medicare age patients and
24:05
Speaker 6: help them really understand their plans each year and help
24:07
Speaker 6: them pick the best plans possible. Because even as a
24:10
Speaker 6: pharmacist that it's confusing to me, you know, and if
24:14
Speaker 6: you don't spend time reviewing those plan changes every year,
24:18
Speaker 6: it's impossible. And I can imagine how hard it is
24:20
Speaker 6: for patients to pick out look at all these different
24:23
Speaker 6: options that they got people calling them left and right,
24:25
Speaker 6: so they know they can come to us. We'll look
24:27
Speaker 6: at their meds and help them pick really the best
24:30
Speaker 6: plan for them. And we also I'm really big into
24:35
Speaker 6: education and knowledge sharing, so we do a lot of
24:38
Speaker 6: presentations locally, whether it's a retirement homes or there's a
24:42
Speaker 6: local Parkinson's support group, just several different local groups that
24:48
Speaker 6: we will come and present on various topics whatever they're
24:51
Speaker 6: interested in, whether it's vaccine guideline changes or Medicare information,
24:58
Speaker 6: supplement information, just to help those patients kind of get
25:03
Speaker 6: the information that they need to help them better take
25:06
Speaker 6: care of themselves.
25:06
Speaker 4: So you're also reaching out to other local organizations and
25:10
Speaker 4: healthcare providers to also do education as well.
25:13
Speaker 6: Yes, exactly.
25:14
Speaker 4: Yeah, I think the Medicare one is really interesting because
25:17
Speaker 4: if you're not in the know, you're not really paying
25:19
Speaker 4: attention to it, especially someone that's in an older generation
25:23
Speaker 4: and you know, I guess a senior citizens who aren't
25:28
Speaker 4: going to really know the ins and outs and the
25:31
Speaker 4: changes that's happening. They probably just go to a pharmacy
25:33
Speaker 4: or doctor and they think that everything's a status quo
25:36
Speaker 4: until it's not, and then they don't know, and then
25:38
Speaker 4: you have to sit down with them and explain it
25:40
Speaker 4: to them, and it's probably very hard for them to understand.
25:43
Speaker 3: So I appreciate that you do that.
25:47
Speaker 4: Can you serve in your community on the local board
25:51
Speaker 4: of Boys and Girls Clubs in the area. What inspired
25:54
Speaker 4: you to get involved with that organization directly and what
25:57
Speaker 4: have you been doing with the Boys and Girls club
26:00
Speaker 4: in your community?
26:02
Speaker 5: Well, actually, I got all the Boys Girl Club probably
26:05
Speaker 5: about seven seven eight years ago when I had a
26:09
Speaker 5: chance to visit one of the local Boys and Girl
26:11
Speaker 5: club in my community, and I was just completely shaw
26:15
Speaker 5: dropped about the the sort of the impact that they
26:18
Speaker 5: have in that area. I have maybe about four to
26:21
Speaker 5: five hundred kids that come through there, and they pay
26:24
Speaker 5: like maybe fifty bucks a year something crazy like that,
26:28
Speaker 5: and they get free meals, after school, tutoring, they get
26:30
Speaker 5: bused to the school, They're getting exposure to all these
26:34
Speaker 5: things for an inner city kind of underserved community that
26:37
Speaker 5: I would never imagine would be possible. For example, they got,
26:41
Speaker 5: you know, a ship to the West Side where they
26:43
Speaker 5: actually had sailing training certification for an inner city kid.
26:48
Speaker 5: I've never heard of that. And then they would be
26:50
Speaker 5: sponsored by the Dodgers, so they would have a full
26:52
Speaker 5: Dodgery reform, going to Dodger Stadium and do things. And
26:55
Speaker 5: they're getting exposure to things I never thought would be
26:57
Speaker 5: possible because I was a part of that community once
27:00
Speaker 5: upon a time. I was just so impressed. I just said,
27:03
Speaker 5: what can I do? How can I get involved with this?
27:07
Speaker 5: You know, do I donate, do I give you whatever?
27:09
Speaker 5: So they put me on the board of directors and
27:12
Speaker 5: I've been on since. I worked with them very closely.
27:15
Speaker 5: As a matter of fact, my nonprofit now worked with
27:17
Speaker 5: the Boys and Girls Club to open a nonprofit pharmacy
27:20
Speaker 5: in the heart of East LA, you know, Central LA,
27:24
Speaker 5: And we just opened it about a month ago, and
27:26
Speaker 5: it's tailored specifically to serving this community. So everybody there
27:30
Speaker 5: is Hispanic and low income, and so there's about six
27:33
Speaker 5: to eight hundred families there that are in sort of
27:35
Speaker 5: almost a pharmacy desert type area, and we're going out
27:38
Speaker 5: there to basically provide services whatever they need, and you know,
27:42
Speaker 5: if there's assistance that's needed, it'll be funneled through the
27:45
Speaker 5: foundation to cover for that. And it's been it's been
27:50
Speaker 5: a wonderful partnership, to be honest with you. I mean,
27:53
Speaker 5: even the pharmacy itself it says, you know, powered by
27:55
Speaker 5: the Boys and Girls Club because we want to support them.
27:57
Speaker 5: And they have this campaign that's called the Kindness Campaign,
28:00
Speaker 5: So it's a pledge that that's made to basically and
28:05
Speaker 5: by the way, I'm so proud of this of our
28:06
Speaker 5: Boys and Girls Club. It actually started this campaign for
28:09
Speaker 5: the whole boys come in the country, right, it's called
28:11
Speaker 5: the Kindness Campaign. We are actually featured on the Rose Parade.
28:14
Speaker 5: I mean crazy, never a Boys and Girls club been
28:16
Speaker 5: featured in the Rose Parade. So we're on there. Even
28:19
Speaker 5: at the time the President a few years ago, Biden
28:22
Speaker 5: came by to pledge his kindness in our club. It
28:26
Speaker 5: was crazy, secret service everywhere. It was amazing and it
28:30
Speaker 5: was something that you never would dream of, right, because
28:32
Speaker 5: of the impact that it did in that community. And
28:36
Speaker 5: now I think there's a bunch of of course we're
28:38
Speaker 5: in Hollywood here in La so celebs. Now we're all
28:41
Speaker 5: signing on we want to do a kindness campaign across
28:44
Speaker 5: the country. We're actually flying everywhere, not myself, but of
28:48
Speaker 5: course my club and being a part of that. I
28:51
Speaker 5: claim a little bit of credit to be a part
28:52
Speaker 5: of that organization where we're going out there to spread
28:55
Speaker 5: unquote this concept of kindness, which I think is just awesome,
28:58
Speaker 5: you know, and we're constantly to do and things like that.
29:00
Speaker 5: And we, like just a couple months ago, hosted a
29:03
Speaker 5: kind as Carnival which is completely free. A couple hundred
29:06
Speaker 5: kids that came in completely free rides. There was like
29:09
Speaker 5: cotton candy, there was games, there was you know, performances.
29:13
Speaker 5: It was pretty crazy actually, and this was all just
29:17
Speaker 5: just for the kids.
29:19
Speaker 6: No.
29:19
Speaker 3: I love that.
29:19
Speaker 4: I think, yeah, it's one thing the world needs more
29:23
Speaker 4: and more of with each passing day, is kindness.
29:25
Speaker 3: So I love that.
29:27
Speaker 4: And I'm going to stay with you real quick because
29:29
Speaker 4: and you know, obviously, Jess, I want to get your
29:31
Speaker 4: take on this, because both of you have empowered not
29:34
Speaker 4: only your patients but also your pharmacy staff to serve
29:40
Speaker 4: the community beyond your pharmacy walls. Can You had mentioned
29:44
Speaker 4: about mobilizing other pharmacists and providers in the area to
29:47
Speaker 4: care for the homeless on house patients. Tell me a
29:51
Speaker 4: little bit more how you and your colleagues have gotten
29:54
Speaker 4: together to improve the health and quality of life for
29:57
Speaker 4: these patients and you know, really empowering your staff to
30:01
Speaker 4: get involved as well.
30:02
Speaker 3: How have you done that?
30:04
Speaker 5: Well, I think it's it's not I mean, none of
30:07
Speaker 5: this can happen in isolation. Nobody can do this alone,
30:10
Speaker 5: you know, I mean, as one, there's only so much
30:12
Speaker 5: impact we can have. But as a team, then we
30:15
Speaker 5: can do a lot. So I'm very proud of my team.
30:19
Speaker 5: There's you know, pharmacists that are very aligned in terms
30:22
Speaker 5: of our desire to serve that community. We come together
30:25
Speaker 5: and you know, we do a lot of good work,
30:28
Speaker 5: whether it's through the foundation or through a nonprofit or
30:30
Speaker 5: even day to day at our stores. I think that they,
30:35
Speaker 5: you know, are pretty much on a regular list of
30:37
Speaker 5: folks that go out on a month to month basis
30:40
Speaker 5: to go to community health centers, adult daycare centers, to
30:44
Speaker 5: do presentations, to talk about health, to provide access. In
30:49
Speaker 5: addition to of course the what we call street medicine
30:53
Speaker 5: walking on the streets, which we are a little cautious
30:55
Speaker 5: about that to be honest, just because it was a
30:57
Speaker 5: little bit dangerous. It is the streets, and it's not
31:02
Speaker 5: as dangerous as you think, but it's still a little bit.
31:05
Speaker 5: We had to be careful because you know, you know
31:06
Speaker 5: a lot of folks do suffer from mental health issues
31:09
Speaker 5: and whatnot, and we do carry a lot of medications
31:12
Speaker 5: and things like that, so it's just very cautious about that.
31:14
Speaker 5: But we still try to get as much of our
31:17
Speaker 5: pharmacists as well as our students as well, because we
31:19
Speaker 5: have a lot of interns and we have a lot
31:21
Speaker 5: of working relationships with the various universities in Southern California,
31:24
Speaker 5: so they also get a part and engage in that process.
31:27
Speaker 5: So I think it's just more of spreading the word
31:30
Speaker 5: and providing opportunities. I think everyone genuinely wants to help,
31:33
Speaker 5: they just don't know how to. So when you provide
31:35
Speaker 5: the platform and you provide signing sheets and you will
31:37
Speaker 5: find all these different events, then they'll just sign up.
31:40
Speaker 5: I mean, it's just kind of a it's almost like
31:43
Speaker 5: you know, quote unquote kindness, right, you start seeing it,
31:45
Speaker 5: you start feeling it, you start seeing the impact, and
31:48
Speaker 5: you start doing it. You know, it's almost it's almost
31:50
Speaker 5: becomes commonplace and expected in our organization that you're going
31:54
Speaker 5: to be active in the community and you're going to
31:55
Speaker 5: have to do something to get back.
31:58
Speaker 4: So yeah, that I actually volunteer here every month for
32:02
Speaker 4: the homeless and dropping off supplies and food and you
32:05
Speaker 4: know a lot of different things like that. So that
32:08
Speaker 4: hits home for me. And you're completely right about it
32:12
Speaker 4: can be dangerous. There was a lot of you know,
32:14
Speaker 4: mental health aspects of that that can be very challenging.
32:18
Speaker 4: So I give you guys a lot of credit for
32:20
Speaker 4: doing that. Jesse, I want to shift it to you.
32:23
Speaker 4: How have you empowered your staff to serve the community
32:25
Speaker 4: beyond the pharmacy doors. You told a great story at RBC.
32:31
Speaker 4: We saw your story about have your help during hurricane
32:34
Speaker 4: I was sorry, sorry it was a hurricane. Yeah, I
32:37
Speaker 4: lean and we so I know there was a huge
32:42
Speaker 4: call to action, but I think for that, I feel
32:45
Speaker 4: like your staff would just kind.
32:46
Speaker 3: Of mobilize and help.
32:48
Speaker 4: But how have you gotten your your staff empowered and
32:52
Speaker 4: into getting getting I guess motivated with all these different
32:56
Speaker 4: things happening in today's healthcare landscape.
32:59
Speaker 6: Yeah, so you know, as Ken said, we you know
33:04
Speaker 6: your staff is so important and we are so fortunate
33:08
Speaker 6: and I am so thankful for our staff because without them,
33:11
Speaker 6: we would not be where we are today. And so,
33:15
Speaker 6: you know, especially our pharmacy technicians, you know, it's it's
33:19
Speaker 6: hard work. And we during COVID, you know, that was
33:25
Speaker 6: a whole new challenge, but they came to work every day.
33:27
Speaker 6: They showed up even though you know, they were putting
33:29
Speaker 6: themselves in their family at risk. But they also volunteered
33:34
Speaker 6: to learn new services. So our texts signed up to
33:38
Speaker 6: start doing COVID and FLU testing. You know, with COVID,
33:43
Speaker 6: texts can now become immunized certified, so it doesn't just
33:46
Speaker 6: have to be the pharmacist. And a number of our
33:50
Speaker 6: techts volunteered to take that course and become certified to
33:55
Speaker 6: be able to give shots. And you know they still
33:57
Speaker 6: help us with that today. And last we got a
34:00
Speaker 6: couple of really large state run facilities in our town
34:06
Speaker 6: to give all of their flu shots for their employees,
34:11
Speaker 6: and our techs came with us. You know, in those
34:14
Speaker 6: clinics they start at seven in the morning, so you've
34:17
Speaker 6: got to be there about six forty. And one of
34:20
Speaker 6: my texts actually just yesterday he said, Jesse, are we
34:23
Speaker 6: doing the clinics again this year. I'd be happy to help,
34:26
Speaker 6: you know, happy to get up and meet me at
34:29
Speaker 6: six forty five in the morning. And I think, you know,
34:32
Speaker 6: it's just because they know that they're providing this extra
34:35
Speaker 6: service for our community. And also you know, they're they're
34:40
Speaker 6: doing more than just putting pills in a bottle, and so,
34:43
Speaker 6: you know, I think it helps them to be a
34:46
Speaker 6: little more fulfilled. And we are. You know, we're part
34:50
Speaker 6: of a national organization called CPSN, and there's a lot
34:53
Speaker 6: of additional you know, outside of filling opportunities, and one
34:58
Speaker 6: of them is to do a like a health assessment
35:00
Speaker 6: survey with patients. And I have someone who is a
35:03
Speaker 6: cashier and she loves doing them. And so it's basically
35:07
Speaker 6: just identifying needs that patients have, whether it's transportation, housing,
35:12
Speaker 6: anything like that, and connecting them to local resources. Uh.
35:18
Speaker 6: And so just all of our staff loves being able
35:20
Speaker 6: to kind of go above and beyond for our patients
35:24
Speaker 6: in our community, which I love.
35:28
Speaker 3: Yeah, I love I love that.
35:29
Speaker 4: I love that your staff is already just you know, volunteering,
35:32
Speaker 4: let's let's do this.
35:33
Speaker 3: I'm ready. Yeah, that's that's.
35:35
Speaker 4: That means you definitely have a great stat that's buying
35:37
Speaker 4: into all the great things that you're doing. I do
35:40
Speaker 4: want to shift the conversation because you know, Jesse, you
35:43
Speaker 4: have brought up you know, being involved at uh you
35:47
Speaker 4: know for pharmacy advocacy, state, local levels, the different things
35:50
Speaker 4: that you're doing behind the scenes to help advocate for
35:53
Speaker 4: independent pharmacies.
35:55
Speaker 3: Uh, you know, for for each of you, what.
35:57
Speaker 4: What has your involvement been at the pharmacy advocate So
36:00
Speaker 4: are at pharmacy advocacy level, either in the state or national, Jesse,
36:05
Speaker 4: I'll start with you.
36:07
Speaker 6: Yeah, So I think my kind of roundabout way into
36:13
Speaker 6: community pharmacy gave me a bit of an advantage on
36:17
Speaker 6: the legislative front because you know, whereas my parents, the PBMs,
36:22
Speaker 6: they just kind of started getting used to every new
36:25
Speaker 6: thing that they did, you know, all the abuses that
36:28
Speaker 6: they were doing. Whereas with me, you know, I just
36:31
Speaker 6: came in all at once and saw everything all at
36:33
Speaker 6: once that PBMs were doing, like dir fes and that
36:36
Speaker 6: kind of thing, and when we took over, we were
36:38
Speaker 6: like this is absurd, Like there's no way this can
36:42
Speaker 6: be legal, you know, just seeing all these losses. So
36:46
Speaker 6: I just you know, with my previous job. I was
36:48
Speaker 6: used to working all the time. So with here I
36:51
Speaker 6: got home, I didn't have anything to do, so I'd start,
36:53
Speaker 6: you know, sending off emails, filing complaints on the North
36:56
Speaker 6: Carolina Permitive Insurance website, anything I could think of, because
37:00
Speaker 6: I was like, this has got to stop. This, this
37:03
Speaker 6: is not right, and this is going to put us
37:04
Speaker 6: out of business. And so through all that complaining, uh,
37:10
Speaker 6: one of our state representatives got my information and actually
37:15
Speaker 6: it was we're I remember it very clearly. We're on
37:18
Speaker 6: the bus shuttle bus going to RBC in Vegas and
37:22
Speaker 6: he called me and I was like shocked. That's kind
37:26
Speaker 6: of like, you know, fangirl at that time, like oh
37:29
Speaker 6: my gosh, the state representative is calling me on myself.
37:34
Speaker 6: But he's basically just asked if I'd be interested in
37:36
Speaker 6: joining this committee that was trying to get PBM reform
37:38
Speaker 6: past to North Carolina. And I was like absolutely. So
37:43
Speaker 6: that's how it kind of started, and I've just been
37:45
Speaker 6: involved ever since, just trying to reach out to legislators,
37:50
Speaker 6: make them aware, get changes to happen. And I've learned
37:55
Speaker 6: a lot during this process, and you know, learn that
37:59
Speaker 6: it takes time and we were fortunate in North Carolina
38:03
Speaker 6: after you know, RBC was several years ago right in Vegas.
38:09
Speaker 6: So finally this summer we got a PBM bill pass
38:14
Speaker 6: in North Carolina. So after years and years of fighting
38:18
Speaker 6: for it, I mean, it doesn't have everything that we'd like,
38:21
Speaker 6: but it's a starting point and so you know, that's exciting.
38:27
Speaker 6: But we'll just you know, just continue to fight. And
38:29
Speaker 6: on a federal level, you know, it's a little bit harder,
38:32
Speaker 6: it's a little bit slower, but I always just always
38:35
Speaker 6: am taking the opportunity to reach out. We finally had
38:39
Speaker 6: one of our federal representatives Congress spend him more visit
38:42
Speaker 6: our store a couple of weeks ago. And I've been
38:45
Speaker 6: asking our federal reps to come to the store for
38:50
Speaker 6: a few years, so that was exciting. I finally got
38:51
Speaker 6: him to agree. But I just spend a lot of
38:54
Speaker 6: time reaching out to them, advocating, taking any little opportunity
38:59
Speaker 6: I can hand, Like during Hurricane Helene, we got an
39:02
Speaker 6: audit by one of the Big Three, and you know
39:06
Speaker 6: a lot of stores in our area didn't have power,
39:09
Speaker 6: so it was amazing we even got the facts to
39:11
Speaker 6: come through. But I just took that opportunity to send
39:15
Speaker 6: that to our all our state reps to be like, hey,
39:18
Speaker 6: we're in the middle of a natural disaster. We're writing
39:22
Speaker 6: emergency scripts. We're sending meds and Shinnook helicopters up to
39:26
Speaker 6: even for their western North Carolina for patients that are
39:29
Speaker 6: without everything, and you know, we don't have water and
39:32
Speaker 6: power at home, and this PBM is auditing us like
39:35
Speaker 6: the audacity of it. And I've never gotten so many
39:38
Speaker 6: responses from my say so, yeah, it's just taking taking
39:46
Speaker 6: the opportunity to make sure that they know because if
39:48
Speaker 6: you don't fight for your business, no one else is
39:51
Speaker 6: going to. And that's what I learned when taking over
39:54
Speaker 6: the pharmacy because the PBMs make everything so complicated the
39:59
Speaker 6: state federal reps. I mean now they're starting to understand,
40:03
Speaker 6: but they're not going to know it like you do.
40:05
Speaker 4: Yeah, getting getting audited during a hurricane situation, that's pretty
40:09
Speaker 4: that's as low as it cats, to be honest.
40:12
Speaker 6: Yeah, and you know, uh so, I I in my
40:15
Speaker 6: frustration that because they actually did it two days in
40:17
Speaker 6: a row. In my frustration, I took a picture and
40:20
Speaker 6: I put it on this like Independent Owners Group, and
40:22
Speaker 6: then someone took it and shared it and then got
40:24
Speaker 6: shared and went kind of viral. So this PBM they
40:28
Speaker 6: actually ended up calling the store and I saw it
40:31
Speaker 6: on the caller ID, and I was like, oh, my gosh,
40:33
Speaker 6: they're gonna end her contract, you know, because they could
40:36
Speaker 6: they can do whatever they want.
40:38
Speaker 3: Wow.
40:39
Speaker 6: Yeah, So I was very nervous, but she when I
40:43
Speaker 6: took the phone call, she said that they were ending
40:46
Speaker 6: the audit, like, not just for us, but for every
40:49
Speaker 6: Hurricane Helen impacted store across several states. But the reason
40:53
Speaker 6: she gave me was not because you're in the middle
40:55
Speaker 6: of a natural disaster or you know, we know that
40:58
Speaker 6: your staff has stressed your communities dress. The reason she
41:01
Speaker 6: gave me is because that she was getting they were
41:03
Speaker 6: getting blasted on social media.
41:05
Speaker 5: Yeah.
41:06
Speaker 4: I mean then that that's the type of stuff it
41:09
Speaker 4: takes to get their attention, right.
41:11
Speaker 3: Yeah.
41:11
Speaker 4: Unfortunately, unfortunately you have to you know, leave those hurdles, jump,
41:15
Speaker 4: you know, jump through those hoops to make stuff like
41:16
Speaker 4: that happen.
41:17
Speaker 3: But it does get noticed.
41:19
Speaker 4: So there is an impact can from your from your
41:22
Speaker 4: insight where where you at. I know you do a
41:25
Speaker 4: lot with advocate advocating for for pharmacists, especially at a
41:29
Speaker 4: state and national level. Where do you stand right now
41:33
Speaker 4: as far as what your involvement is and what successes
41:36
Speaker 4: have you seen, and some of the lessons that you
41:39
Speaker 4: can give and provide to other pharmacists that may be
41:42
Speaker 4: a little gun shy about getting into advocacy on a
41:46
Speaker 4: on a state or national level.
41:50
Speaker 5: I will say this, I mean, I think that sometimes
41:52
Speaker 5: we underestimate what we can do as individuals. I really
41:56
Speaker 5: do feel that until you've felt the power of you know,
42:00
Speaker 5: of making impact and making change, you don't really know
42:05
Speaker 5: that you're able to do these things. So I think,
42:08
Speaker 5: really I've been I mean obviously involved with accuracy for
42:12
Speaker 5: a long time, and so I think the one thing
42:15
Speaker 5: that maybe I could share is like during our during
42:18
Speaker 5: my time as president at the California Pharmacists Association, we
42:21
Speaker 5: were challenged by the state in terms of massive medical
42:24
Speaker 5: cuts at the time, and I remember having to stay
42:26
Speaker 5: at dinner with a few of my members and they're
42:29
Speaker 5: just complaining, They're saying they're going to sue you do
42:30
Speaker 5: all these things, and I was like, hey, hey, just calm down, guys,
42:33
Speaker 5: we really need to work together. We want to make
42:35
Speaker 5: any type of impact. If you do this alone, you
42:37
Speaker 5: do this alone. You do this alone, nothing's going to happen.
42:39
Speaker 5: And they're like, well, they never do nothing happens. So
42:41
Speaker 5: I said, well, why don't we wait, So we actually
42:44
Speaker 5: gathered them. I went back to the board and I said, hey,
42:46
Speaker 5: I need an emergency meeting. Let's go and see what
42:48
Speaker 5: we can get everyone to bad together and maybe we
42:52
Speaker 5: can either pursue legal action or legislative action against the
42:56
Speaker 5: state to ensure that these you know, massive cuts were
42:59
Speaker 5: not being done. So long short of it is that
43:03
Speaker 5: the legal came back and say, we're going to do this.
43:05
Speaker 5: We need like one and a half million dollars. Okay, ken,
43:07
Speaker 5: this is ridiculous. We've never done this. We've only raised
43:09
Speaker 5: one or two hundred thousand dollars in the history of
43:12
Speaker 5: our organization, even as large as the California Pharmacy Association was,
43:16
Speaker 5: and I think it was like three hundred at one
43:17
Speaker 5: point for one of our efforts. And they go, this
43:20
Speaker 5: is it won't work. And I was say, hey, give me,
43:22
Speaker 5: give me some time. What if I can amass a
43:23
Speaker 5: one point five million dollars for us to do this campaign?
43:26
Speaker 5: And they're like that's impossible. I said, well, as a president,
43:29
Speaker 5: give me a chance if you let me. If I can't,
43:31
Speaker 5: then we can call it off. And so they go sure,
43:33
Speaker 5: and from there we went on town halls. I remember
43:36
Speaker 5: going out to talk to everyone and everything, and before
43:39
Speaker 5: we know it, we'd raise one and a half millions.
43:42
Speaker 5: We're just never heard of, and then we were able
43:44
Speaker 5: to mount a huge legal as well as a whole
43:48
Speaker 5: entire legislative of almost a black list campaign against the state.
43:53
Speaker 5: And then the crazy thing is that they actually came
43:55
Speaker 5: back and said, hey, you know, you guys are making
43:56
Speaker 5: this look super bad. How can we get you to
43:58
Speaker 5: stop sou less? You know what? You got to forgive
44:01
Speaker 5: this two hundred and fifty million dollars take back. You go, oh,
44:05
Speaker 5: that's too much. It's out of our budget. Bla blah blah.
44:07
Speaker 5: They went back and forth, and so we were like, okay, well,
44:09
Speaker 5: here's the deal. This campaign actually involves the TakeBack of
44:12
Speaker 5: medical but it also involves the change and everything. And
44:15
Speaker 5: they said, okay, well if we take Isaac, what did
44:17
Speaker 5: you take out the change? They took out the chains.
44:19
Speaker 5: They're like, oh, it's one hundred and sixty million towards
44:21
Speaker 5: independent pharmacies. I was like, okay, we can handle one
44:23
Speaker 5: hundred and sixty million. Can you just take that? And
44:25
Speaker 5: they go, are you okay with that? I was like, yeah,
44:27
Speaker 5: because the chains didn't participate in our campaign. They didn't
44:30
Speaker 5: they didn't donate anything, so you can leave them out.
44:32
Speaker 5: I don't care. And they go, all right, a deal,
44:35
Speaker 5: So if you're willing to do that, will drop this
44:37
Speaker 5: cut and change you guys, drop your legal and all
44:41
Speaker 5: your negative campaign adds against us. I was like, okay,
44:44
Speaker 5: And we actually got one hundred and sixty million dollars
44:46
Speaker 5: okay of independent pharmacy money which would bankrupt probably about
44:50
Speaker 5: fifty percent of US reclaimed, which was unbelievable, amazing feeling
44:57
Speaker 5: I've ever had, and that you know, empowerment of thinking
45:00
Speaker 5: that we can make a difference and we could really
45:02
Speaker 5: make a change, so, you know, and then of course
45:04
Speaker 5: I was able to you know, continue that, you know,
45:06
Speaker 5: being the VP at NCPA now on a more federal
45:10
Speaker 5: national level and recently we're working on obviously the new
45:12
Speaker 5: PPM reformat. We've had a couple of shots at this
45:15
Speaker 5: and weren't very successful. So now it happened that very
45:18
Speaker 5: fortunate that one of the Congressmen, Derek Tran is actually
45:23
Speaker 5: in southern California and happens to be someone in my district,
45:27
Speaker 5: around my district, and now we're very good close friends.
45:30
Speaker 5: As a matter of fact, I was able to get
45:31
Speaker 5: invited to his inauguration in DC. Actually happened to be
45:37
Speaker 5: on the same flight with him. It's just all random
45:39
Speaker 5: about how things happen in life. And now we're supporting
45:42
Speaker 5: him in multiple ways. And of course he's going to
45:43
Speaker 5: be a sponsor of this VPM reformat that hopefully provides
45:47
Speaker 5: some level of payment structure for us on a more
45:52
Speaker 5: national front. And so I just think that is very empowering,
45:55
Speaker 5: and I think that it's unfortunately a necessary evil now
45:58
Speaker 5: that we need to participate. I hate politics, but I
46:01
Speaker 5: do feel that we need to fight for what is
46:03
Speaker 5: ours and what is rightfully appropriate for all the work
46:07
Speaker 5: that we do for our team members and for our patients.
46:10
Speaker 5: So I think it's something that you understand as a
46:13
Speaker 5: part of the job. You know, if you don't stand
46:16
Speaker 5: up for your rights like what Jesse has done, I
46:18
Speaker 5: think it's absolutely amazing. You know, she was able to
46:22
Speaker 5: really showcase how bad some of these players are in
46:25
Speaker 5: the marketplace that is really putting us out of business.
46:27
Speaker 5: And putting patients and access at risk. So from that front,
46:31
Speaker 5: I just think that you know, whether you like it
46:34
Speaker 5: or not, you've got to embrace it. You got to
46:36
Speaker 5: do it, and you have to understand that any little
46:38
Speaker 5: work that you do can make an impact.
46:40
Speaker 3: Yeah.
46:40
Speaker 4: From somebody that I knew a while back said it
46:42
Speaker 4: best get into politics or get out of pharmacy, which
46:45
Speaker 4: I always thought was pretty poetic. You know, Jesse, from
46:49
Speaker 4: your work within you know, during Hurricane Helen and everything
46:52
Speaker 4: you went through. This really question for both of you,
46:56
Speaker 4: what do you think I did mention this earlier? But
46:59
Speaker 4: what are some little steps that you think independence can
47:02
Speaker 4: do to start getting.
47:03
Speaker 3: Involved if they haven't been involved yet.
47:05
Speaker 4: I think getting started is kind of the main thing,
47:09
Speaker 4: because Jesse, to your point, once those doors open and
47:12
Speaker 4: you start getting involved, you start really seeing the impact
47:16
Speaker 4: you can make. And from what Ken said, strengthen numbers
47:19
Speaker 4: people come together. You're stronger than you think you are.
47:21
Speaker 4: So Jesse, how do you what advice can you give?
47:25
Speaker 6: Yeah? And now are you talking about legislatively?
47:27
Speaker 3: Correct?
47:28
Speaker 5: Yeah?
47:29
Speaker 6: So the one thing that every pharmacy owner should do
47:34
Speaker 6: right now today, if they haven't, is reach out to
47:37
Speaker 6: your local reps. Your state level reps. Just shoot them
47:40
Speaker 6: an email, give them a phone call both, and invite
47:43
Speaker 6: them to your store. It's so easy, and that's really
47:48
Speaker 6: one of the ways that I got started too. And
47:52
Speaker 6: so once they come in and you don't even you
47:54
Speaker 6: don't have to prepare anything, which actually NCPA has a
47:58
Speaker 6: ton of great resources on their website. But once they see,
48:03
Speaker 6: once they come in and they see your store and
48:05
Speaker 6: they see you greet patients by name, and they see
48:09
Speaker 6: how different you are from chain pharmacies, they will understand
48:13
Speaker 6: the importance of fighting to keep you open and fighting
48:17
Speaker 6: for PBM reform. So just kind of that first hand experience,
48:20
Speaker 6: and then also just building a relationship with them too
48:24
Speaker 6: is so important. So I know both of my local reps,
48:28
Speaker 6: and you know, I think they've gotten tired of all
48:31
Speaker 6: my constant emailing and phone calls. But they both were
48:35
Speaker 6: sponsors on our PBM bill in North Carolina, and they're
48:39
Speaker 6: not going to do that if they don't know you
48:42
Speaker 6: and know the importance of it. And that's such an
48:45
Speaker 6: easy way to get started.
48:48
Speaker 5: Ken, what about you, I think pretty much similar. I mean,
48:53
Speaker 5: you know, I think Jesse kind of summarized it pretty well.
48:55
Speaker 5: I mean, there's so many different ways to get involved.
48:57
Speaker 5: I mean, I think that you know, maybe another way
49:01
Speaker 5: is to get involved in your local association. On the
49:04
Speaker 5: state level, right, it's low level, like entry, and they
49:07
Speaker 5: always have some advocacy leg or front and you might
49:11
Speaker 5: just be able to just you know, squeeze right in
49:14
Speaker 5: and follow a long suit in terms of what it's
49:16
Speaker 5: happening there. But local reps are a great way because
49:20
Speaker 5: they are you know, they need your votes and so
49:24
Speaker 5: of course they are much more willing to listen on
49:27
Speaker 5: what your thoughts and your needs are, your concerns are.
49:30
Speaker 5: But there's just so many ways. It's not as hard
49:32
Speaker 5: as everyone thinks, because at the end of the day,
49:36
Speaker 5: you know, we do have to represent ourselves, because if
49:42
Speaker 5: you're going to wait for someone else next to you
49:44
Speaker 5: or someone else to your left or right to do it,
49:46
Speaker 5: that might not ever happen. And then basically you just
49:50
Speaker 5: end up complaining about how difficult life is when you're
49:54
Speaker 5: not really doing anything to potentially make a change. So
49:57
Speaker 5: I think those are definitely two areas that I I
50:00
Speaker 5: think from a personal experience side, that I think has
50:03
Speaker 5: allowed me at least at least an entryway to feeling
50:08
Speaker 5: more comfortable about approaching either a legislator or a local representative,
50:13
Speaker 5: or maybe going and getting involved at the state association level,
50:17
Speaker 5: because those are both great channels to kind of serve
50:20
Speaker 5: as an intro to you know how your boys can
50:24
Speaker 5: can mean something?
50:25
Speaker 4: Well Son, Okay, so final a question for each of
50:28
Speaker 4: you can I'll start with you within the next year.
50:31
Speaker 4: How are you most excited to serve your community as
50:34
Speaker 4: an independent pharmacist? What do you what do you see
50:36
Speaker 4: coming in the in the near future, and what excites you?
50:39
Speaker 4: What what lights your fire a little bit more.
50:43
Speaker 5: I feel that believe how the profession is sort of changing.
50:47
Speaker 5: I think we're at a tipping point, and I believe
50:49
Speaker 5: it or not, I have actually a very positive outlook conpharmacy,
50:53
Speaker 5: despite some of my colleagues kind of thinking it's doom
50:55
Speaker 5: and gloom. I felt that I've been here long enough
50:58
Speaker 5: to know that things happen inside and when things get
51:01
Speaker 5: really bad, it's also when it allows for things to
51:04
Speaker 5: get better. It's because now we're sort of at this
51:08
Speaker 5: point where things are pretty bad, I mean probably as
51:11
Speaker 5: bad it's been as far as I can remember as
51:13
Speaker 5: a pharmacist, and I do feel that it is a
51:17
Speaker 5: turning point. I think that when there's no there's not
51:20
Speaker 5: much more you can give, that's when people start noticing
51:22
Speaker 5: and changing. That's when our voices get louder and patients,
51:25
Speaker 5: you know, get more emotional and passionate about what they
51:30
Speaker 5: can do to keep us in business. I think it
51:33
Speaker 5: is an inflection point, and I think that's where I'm
51:35
Speaker 5: excited about because it's almost like when I came out
51:39
Speaker 5: of school about twenty some years ago, I remember that
51:42
Speaker 5: it was almost a golden Asia pharmacy where you know,
51:44
Speaker 5: a lot of pharmacists were like, there's a shortage and
51:47
Speaker 5: people can find jobs everywhere, and they're very excited because
51:49
Speaker 5: they're getting bonuses. In my state, people are getting BMW's
51:52
Speaker 5: to sign on and sign on bonuses. And I feel
51:55
Speaker 5: that those times are sort of maybe coming back. And
51:58
Speaker 5: the reason I say that is because if you look
52:00
Speaker 5: at the statistics the next three to four years, there's
52:03
Speaker 5: actually a huge shortage of pharmacists coming out of school,
52:06
Speaker 5: but yet the job market is continue to grow and expand.
52:09
Speaker 5: And also, as an independent pharmacist, I do feel that,
52:12
Speaker 5: you know, we're as close as will ever be to
52:15
Speaker 5: any meaningful PPM reform you know, I think many people
52:19
Speaker 5: have said this and I'll continue to say it, And
52:21
Speaker 5: is that when I first started this journey, no one
52:23
Speaker 5: knew what a PBM was. Now everyone knows what's a
52:25
Speaker 5: PBM was. When I go there, that's all I wanted
52:28
Speaker 5: to talk about, but no one cared. And now when
52:30
Speaker 5: I go in there, I talk about other things, all
52:31
Speaker 5: they want to do is switch to topics to PBMs.
52:33
Speaker 5: So what that tells you is that we're at a
52:35
Speaker 5: point where it's just about to happen. We just have
52:38
Speaker 5: to be a little patient, we have to be a
52:40
Speaker 5: little consistent in our messaging and just not stop fighting,
52:45
Speaker 5: you know. And I feel that we're almost there, at
52:47
Speaker 5: the brink of this of this revolution of change that
52:50
Speaker 5: will hopefully change, you know, how we do things as pharmacists,
52:55
Speaker 5: open up our abilities to serve the communities that we
52:58
Speaker 5: have worked so hard, all o your shares as pharmacists
53:01
Speaker 5: to serve. So I'm actually very excited, quite.
53:04
Speaker 3: Honestly, it's great to hear ken great insight there too. Jesse,
53:08
Speaker 3: what about.
53:08
Speaker 6: You, well, first, I love to hear Ken's optimism about PBMs.
53:16
Speaker 6: I am I'm hopeful that we can get something done,
53:18
Speaker 6: especially with the the PBM Reform Act, because it is
53:23
Speaker 6: you know, it is defeating over time, you know, continuing
53:28
Speaker 6: to fight these PBMs. But like ken, I'm gonna I'm
53:30
Speaker 6: gonna keep fighting them. Uh that's my passion on the side.
53:35
Speaker 6: But on a you know, community pharmacy front. You know,
53:38
Speaker 6: I mentioned in North Carolina we can do test and
53:40
Speaker 6: treat now for flu. So that's exciting for us. So
53:45
Speaker 6: you know, starting in a month less than a month,
53:49
Speaker 6: we can start writing scripts for Tama flu and so
53:52
Speaker 6: any new service that that comes about, we we jump on.
53:56
Speaker 6: And you know, it's just exciting to offer something different,
53:58
Speaker 6: explore something new, and so I'm excited to see where
54:03
Speaker 6: that takes us. We also recently earlier this year, became
54:07
Speaker 6: the first pharmacy in North Carolina. It become certified for
54:10
Speaker 6: yellow fever vaccines. And we do travel vacing consults too,
54:15
Speaker 6: so we have patients driving from a lot from like
54:18
Speaker 6: Ashville and Charlotte to get yellow fever vaccines. So it's
54:21
Speaker 6: just kind of fun to be able to do something
54:24
Speaker 6: different and offer unique services to our community. So we'll
54:29
Speaker 6: at our pharmacy just keep exploring what additional services we
54:33
Speaker 6: can provide, you know, especially with PCP shortages as those
54:36
Speaker 6: can continue to grow.
54:39
Speaker 3: Well.
54:39
Speaker 4: I think that's a great way to end this podcast,
54:42
Speaker 4: and for all of you listening, I think you could
54:44
Speaker 4: see why Jesse and Ken were nominated as a Community
54:48
Speaker 4: Leadership Award. Finally, I mean, you guys are absolutely incredible.
54:51
Speaker 4: Thank you so much on behalf of Cardinal Health and
54:53
Speaker 4: everybody listening. I do want to say thanks again you
54:56
Speaker 4: Ken and Jesse for providing all these amazing insights and
54:59
Speaker 4: unique ways they're contributing to the overall success of independent
55:02
Speaker 4: pharmacists and caring for their communities. I hope all of
55:05
Speaker 4: you listening gained some great ideas and insights on how
55:07
Speaker 4: to get more involved and to keep advocating and fighting
55:10
Speaker 4: on how important independent pharmacy business owners are to each
55:14
Speaker 4: in every community. And to all of you, thanks for
55:16
Speaker 4: listening to today's episode of the Cardinal Health counter Talk podcast.
55:19
Speaker 4: As a reminder, if this is your first time listening,
55:22
Speaker 4: make sure you subscribe and download the Cardinal Health counter
55:25
Speaker 4: Talk podcast wherever you get your podcasts. See you on
55:28
Speaker 4: the next episode, and to everyone, take care of