Latest / Pharmacy Podcast Network / NCPA Annual Meeting RECAP Show | Part One

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NCPA Annual Meeting RECAP Show | Part One · Pharmacy Podcast Network

• 0:07
  Speaker 1: You are listening to the Pharmacy Podcast Network.
• 0:22
  Speaker 2: Welcome to the Pharmacy Podcast Network's coverage of the NCPA
• 0:25
  Speaker 2: twenty twenty five Post Show. The NCPA Annual Conference is
• 0:29
  Speaker 2: the trailblazer for community pharmacy, bringing together the pharmacy community.
• 0:34
  Speaker 2: Our host Todd Yuri, founder and CEO of the Pharmacy
• 0:37
  Speaker 2: Podcast Network, took the microphone to the action right on
• 0:41
  Speaker 2: the show floor, capturing exclusive conversations with attendees, pharmacy students,
• 0:46
  Speaker 2: keynote speakers, vendors, and more. You don't want to miss
• 0:50
  Speaker 2: this three part series starting right now. Thank you Real
• 0:53
  Speaker 2: Value RX for sponsoring this episode of the NCPA Post Show.
• 0:57
  Speaker 3: Hey, this is JD.
• 0:58
  Speaker 4: I'm with Real Value OURX and you're listening to the
• 1:01
  Speaker 4: Pharmacy Podcast Network.
• 1:06
  Speaker 5: JD, welcome back.
• 1:07
  Speaker 1: We're at NCPA twenty twenty five. We're here at your booth.
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  Speaker 1: This has been such a good time already. Talk to
• 1:13
  Speaker 1: me what is happening in the world of Real Value.
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: You're keeping us out of jail with the DSCSA stuff,
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: but talk to me about some updates from Real Value.
• 1:23
  Speaker 4: I don't think they've talked about jail time, so that's good. Yeah,
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  Speaker 4: we're fully compliant. We're ready to go. We are connecting
• 1:30
  Speaker 4: people left and right. Pharmacies the larger ones are due
• 1:35
  Speaker 4: next month, smaller ones due in a year, but distributors
• 1:40
  Speaker 4: and manufacturers we're due already. It's already passed for us.
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  Speaker 1: See, that's lots of confusion since the whole thing came
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  Speaker 1: out five, six, seven years ago.
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  Speaker 5: Whatever at first was told, we were told what.
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  Speaker 1: That even meant, and then there's been some deadlines to
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  Speaker 1: keep moving. I'm glad that you guys are always giving
• 1:58
  Speaker 1: us updates as to what's really happen happening. Talk to
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  Speaker 1: me about those smaller pharmacies, which should they be doing
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  Speaker 1: right now in preparation.
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  Speaker 4: Well, take it from those of us who've already converted
• 2:08
  Speaker 4: to this new system, do not wait, because you'll you
• 2:12
  Speaker 4: will kill yourself, you will really knock yourself out trying
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  Speaker 4: to get it done by the deadline, because I really
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  Speaker 4: doubt they're going to extend it for the small pharmacies.
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  Speaker 4: So just find a vendor and sign up with them
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  Speaker 4: and let them take care of it for you, and
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  Speaker 4: then just go back to sleep comfortably.
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  Speaker 1: Talk to me about some of the expansion of what
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  Speaker 1: real value has been doing for your client base and
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  Speaker 1: helping independent community pharmacies thrive, especially some of the new
• 2:40
  Speaker 1: products that you're bringing in.
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  Speaker 4: We have an entire suite of new products coming. We've
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  Speaker 4: got robotic automation that's in place. We are expanding that further.
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  Speaker 4: We have conveyors, we have all kinds of automation coming
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  Speaker 4: into our warehouse to continue expanding and expanding. Our message
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  Speaker 4: is resonating with people, and we are growing and we
• 3:04
  Speaker 4: hope to, you know, work with more and more people.
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  Speaker 1: It's the biggest booth here at NCPA. It's fun to
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  Speaker 1: be on the in the middle of it all. I
• 3:12
  Speaker 1: feel like I'm part of a bigger network. We have
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  Speaker 1: like three other organizations that are all part of this conglomerate.
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  Speaker 5: I just love it.
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  Speaker 6: JD.
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  Speaker 5: Thanks for being part of the NCPA. Absolutely good to
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  Speaker 5: see you again. Hi.
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  Speaker 7: This is Rachel Matts from doc Station and you're listening
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  Speaker 7: to the Pharmacy Podcast Network.
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  Speaker 1: The evolution of independent community pharmacy includes the expansion of
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  Speaker 1: clinical services. We are here with Rachel Mattz from doc Station.
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  Speaker 1: Can I call doc station the OG system the OG
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  Speaker 1: platform Electronic Health record for pharmacists.
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  Speaker 7: Yeah, yeah, you certainly can.
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  Speaker 1: I'm sorry that there's a bunch of them that are
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  Speaker 1: coming out, which is wonderful because we need that technology,
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  Speaker 1: We need pharmacists to start doing things. There are much
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  Speaker 1: more disease state management driven but doc station you guys,
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  Speaker 1: what over ten years ago, a little.
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  Speaker 7: Less than that, but somewhere around eight or so. Yeah, yeah,
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  Speaker 7: definitely came into the scene, you know, really focusing on
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  Speaker 7: value based care and expanding really what the pharmacist is
• 4:22
  Speaker 7: capable of doing, but really wanting to put the word
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  Speaker 7: out there and getting the pharmacist in the forefront is
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  Speaker 7: part of the clinical team for a patient.
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  Speaker 1: So when I think of specialty pharmacy, that would be
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  Speaker 1: the environment that it would be easiest to implement a
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  Speaker 1: system where you're slowing the transaction of or the time
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  Speaker 1: down with the patients to really dig into things. Community
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  Speaker 1: pharmacy one of the harder kind of environments to do that.
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  Speaker 1: And because of the busyness, how are you teaching community
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  Speaker 1: pharmacies independent community pharmacies to leverage doc station? You know,
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  Speaker 1: everybody has the those extra rooms that they never use
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  Speaker 1: for patient counseling, and there's a bunch of boxes in
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  Speaker 1: them and stuff. But it's a time to resurrect that
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  Speaker 1: whole patient engagement. So talk to me about how you're
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  Speaker 1: coaching pharmacists to engage and to use the dock station.
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  Speaker 7: Well, I think that what a lot of folks don't
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  Speaker 7: realize is it's work that they're already doing. So this
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  Speaker 7: isn't intended to change workflow. It isn't intended to add
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  Speaker 7: a burden to the already overburdened pharmacy right, and the
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  Speaker 7: concept of billing for medical encounters. These are medical encounters
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  Speaker 7: that pharmacists are having every day. It's within their scope,
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  Speaker 7: it's what they're trained to do. They're providing medically necessary
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  Speaker 7: information back to the patients and who better to do it.
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  Speaker 6: But the.
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  Speaker 7: You know, kind of misconception I think is that it's hard,
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  Speaker 7: it's something that's difficult to implement. And in reality, the
• 5:56
  Speaker 7: way that I teach and the way that I train
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  Speaker 7: to be able to build medically and use a platform
• 6:00
  Speaker 7: like ours is think about the things that you're already doing,
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  Speaker 7: and you routinely counsel patients. You routinely provide guidance on
• 6:10
  Speaker 7: what vaccines are due or you know why when coming
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  Speaker 7: in for a new condition and being able to provide
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  Speaker 7: that medically necessary information. Now, what a lot of folks
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  Speaker 7: don't realize is those are billable events. Those are bilable
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  Speaker 7: events that a pharmacist should be taking advantage of, and
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  Speaker 7: a platform like ours, you know, is there to help
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  Speaker 7: them make that process easier.
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  Speaker 1: All right, let's talk about implement Now, let's talk about
• 6:34
  Speaker 1: implementation for just a second, but I'm going to come
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  Speaker 1: back to that. Let's talk about an API between docstation
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  Speaker 1: and the pharmacy management systems. What systems are you working
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  Speaker 1: with to make it as easy as possible to implement?
• 6:46
  Speaker 3: Yeah?
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  Speaker 7: Sure, so doc station as API connection with several different
• 6:51
  Speaker 7: MS systems Liberty Pioneer DRS. However, outside of that, I
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  Speaker 7: think it's important to recognize that regardless of the PMS,
• 7:02
  Speaker 7: pharmacies can still use a platform like doc stations to
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  Speaker 7: be able to incorporate patient care, document patient care, and
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  Speaker 7: build for patient care.
• 7:09
  Speaker 5: Excellent.
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  Speaker 1: All right, implementation question, how long would you say it
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  Speaker 1: takes a community pharmacy to get trained and to start
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  Speaker 1: using and start seeing revenue changes for their business.
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  Speaker 7: Good question, And I think it really depends on what
• 7:24
  Speaker 7: the pharmacy wants to focus on. So depending on their state,
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  Speaker 7: there's a lot of different opportunities. The biggest or the
• 7:29
  Speaker 7: easiest way in I guess, is to really focus on
• 7:32
  Speaker 7: what can we do for vaccine revenue. We're in vaccine
• 7:34
  Speaker 7: season now, and so I think that it's important to
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  Speaker 7: recognize what are the opportunities that a pharmacy has from
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  Speaker 7: a business perspective to expand that revenue opportunity, and vaccines
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  Speaker 7: are it. Anytime that we can encourage a pharmacy to
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  Speaker 7: look critically at what they can build medically, that's where
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  Speaker 7: we want to start, and vaccines are part of that.
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  Speaker 7: And so the ability for a pharmacist to or a
• 7:57
  Speaker 7: pharmacy to quickly come in realize they have medical opportunities
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  Speaker 7: to build for a vaccine that they're already dispensing to
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  Speaker 7: a patient or administering to a patient. When you have
• 8:08
  Speaker 7: the opportunity to buy pass the PBM, we want to
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  Speaker 7: help them be able to do that and realize the
• 8:14
  Speaker 7: ACTRA revenue thirty five forty dollars more per vaccine. It's
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  Speaker 7: it's definitely something to consider, and that's the easiest way
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  Speaker 7: in with you know, with doxation, to really realize and
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  Speaker 7: hone in on that outside of a vaccine revenue, you know,
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  Speaker 7: the ability to build medically for consultations, for mtms, for
• 8:34
  Speaker 7: point of care things like that. It's obviously it depends
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  Speaker 7: on what states you're in, but the ability is there,
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  Speaker 7: and so for us to quickly come in, have a
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  Speaker 7: pharmacy recognize that they have uncaptured revenue through vaccines, get
• 8:47
  Speaker 7: them in the door quickly, pretty easy to turn around
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  Speaker 7: once two weeks.
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  Speaker 5: Maybe.
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  Speaker 7: Outside of that, when you really look at especially at
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  Speaker 7: pharmacy that's not used to incorporating medical billing into their workflow,
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  Speaker 7: it does take some effort. It does take some realization
• 8:59
  Speaker 7: on the pharmace season training staff, making sure that they're
• 9:02
  Speaker 7: realizing these are medically necessary events and they're opportunities that
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  Speaker 7: we should be billing for. But you know, kind of
• 9:09
  Speaker 7: outside of the first initial wave of vaccines, getting those
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  Speaker 7: through the door, then we can certainly expand into more
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  Speaker 7: clinical opportunities as well.
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  Speaker 5: Rachel Matt's Doc Station.
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  Speaker 1: Thanks for being here at the NCPA twenty twenty five
• 9:19
  Speaker 1: press coverage post show.
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  Speaker 7: Absolutely of course, happy to be here.
• 9:23
  Speaker 1: Hey listeners, hang on, we'll be right back. Johnny Kello
• 9:30
  Speaker 1: Match Part X. You know, Johnny, I remember when Matt
• 9:33
  Speaker 1: you Rex first came out, I was blown away.
• 9:35
  Speaker 5: It's one of your fans over ten years ago.
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: I want to announce, and it's like, I'm excited that
• 9:43
  Speaker 1: this is the first time we're saying on Pharmacy podcast Network.
• 9:45
  Speaker 5: You're doing a three part series with us.
• 9:47
  Speaker 1: On this week in Pharmacy, we're going to be digging
• 9:49
  Speaker 1: into match our X. Talk to us a little bit
• 9:51
  Speaker 1: about match rex. What is that platform? Why should independent
• 9:54
  Speaker 1: community pharmacies be paying attention?
• 9:56
  Speaker 8: Sure, thanks for having you town and looking forward to
• 9:59
  Speaker 8: that three parts series. So matt x was started fifteen
• 10:02
  Speaker 8: years ago by my business partner who's a pharmacist and myself.
• 10:06
  Speaker 8: We started with three pharmacies with the idea to help
• 10:09
  Speaker 8: independent pharmacies buy and sell their overstock drugs with one another,
• 10:13
  Speaker 8: and we've been fortunate enough to grow to about seven
• 10:16
  Speaker 8: two hundred pharmacies over those years, and we've got a
• 10:20
  Speaker 8: very active community, a very active marketplace. So again, everyone's
• 10:24
  Speaker 8: been in that situation where they have a product and
• 10:27
  Speaker 8: they can't get rid of it or it's going to expire,
• 10:29
  Speaker 8: and we are the outlet, and we've been fortunate enough
• 10:33
  Speaker 8: to gain the primary market share in the space, and
• 10:37
  Speaker 8: then recently We just launched the ability for our secondary
• 10:40
  Speaker 8: wholesalers to sell to our members as well. So we
• 10:44
  Speaker 8: have a dozen secondary wholesalers we just signed up and
• 10:48
  Speaker 8: so and it's going to be and I think we're
• 10:50
  Speaker 8: one of one or two marketplaces that will have and
• 10:53
  Speaker 8: on the marketplace. Parimit just recently adopted us as well and.
• 10:58
  Speaker 5: Just continue to grow.
• 10:58
  Speaker 8: And so we're looking forward to, you know, helping independence
• 11:02
  Speaker 8: more and more in different ways. And we've got a
• 11:05
  Speaker 8: few other opportunities that are coming down the pipeline. And
• 11:09
  Speaker 8: then the big piece that we are really focusing on
• 11:11
  Speaker 8: is the DSCSA and you know, the compliance piece of
• 11:15
  Speaker 8: it for independent pharmacies. Recently partnered up with elis Pedia
• 11:20
  Speaker 8: to help Independence marry together with Elispedia and there'll be
• 11:25
  Speaker 8: more of that to come down the road.
• 11:27
  Speaker 1: We're looking forward to the three part series starting on
• 11:30
  Speaker 1: Turks t w I r X this week in Pharmacy
• 11:34
  Speaker 1: with John Kellow and the Match our ex team. John
• 11:38
  Speaker 1: has been great to catch up with you here at NCPA.
• 11:41
  Speaker 5: Thanks for being on the show.
• 11:42
  Speaker 8: Thanks don have a good day.
• 11:47
  Speaker 1: John to James Value Drug Company Here at the NCPA
• 11:50
  Speaker 1: twenty twenty five.
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  Speaker 5: It's still good to see you.
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  Speaker 9: Always good to see you, Todd.
• 11:54
  Speaker 1: All right, let's get into this challenges with independent community pharmacy.
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  Speaker 1: I mean time something changes in PBM reform, or every
• 12:03
  Speaker 1: time there's a new policy, or every time we're like
• 12:05
  Speaker 1: pushing for provider status, whether it's at the state level
• 12:07
  Speaker 1: or national level. There's all these things that come up
• 12:11
  Speaker 1: that we have to like keep in mind.
• 12:13
  Speaker 5: Of what challenges lie ahead.
• 12:16
  Speaker 1: So, from Value Drugs perspective, you've always done a good
• 12:19
  Speaker 1: job of kind of staying ahead of a lot of stuff,
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: notifying members of things that are happening. What do you
• 12:25
  Speaker 1: want to bring to the attention to our listeners and
• 12:28
  Speaker 1: some of what's happening at Value Drugs.
• 12:30
  Speaker 9: So I think that a uniqueness would Value Drugs. Since
• 12:32
  Speaker 9: I've been there now and I'm coming up on six years.
• 12:35
  Speaker 9: We have a strategy team led by Nicole Hassen myself.
• 12:39
  Speaker 9: I'm on a team also with Margie Lyon. We all
• 12:42
  Speaker 9: have basic disciplines in the pharmaceutical world. In the pharmacy world,
• 12:48
  Speaker 9: Nicole's mortal strategy director. Long term, what are we doing
• 12:51
  Speaker 9: for our members to keep them front and center focused
• 12:54
  Speaker 9: on the issues of pharmacy. I work on some of
• 12:57
  Speaker 9: the clinical stuff. I do a little bit of business
• 13:00
  Speaker 9: development when some of our members are either looking to
• 13:02
  Speaker 9: buy or looking to sell. And then Margie she sets
• 13:05
  Speaker 9: herself up with the long term care facility, which is
• 13:08
  Speaker 9: the combo shop. Is it's a life saver, especially on
• 13:12
  Speaker 9: the Western Pennsylvania side, with Express Scripts being the I
• 13:16
  Speaker 9: don't want to say the preferred PBM, but the PBM
• 13:19
  Speaker 9: that high Mark Hulk or high Mark uses along with UPMC,
• 13:22
  Speaker 9: it's vital if we can do combo shop. And you
• 13:25
  Speaker 9: know our guys are they do a good job with
• 13:28
  Speaker 9: brand drugs. Most people run away from brand drugs, but
• 13:32
  Speaker 9: if you can fit that patient into that combo model,
• 13:35
  Speaker 9: it's it's a lifesaver. I mean you're now you're now
• 13:38
  Speaker 9: making a profit on a brand drug. I mean, when's
• 13:41
  Speaker 9: the last time anybody ever heard that most people are
• 13:44
  Speaker 9: running away from brand drugs? So, you know, so you know,
• 13:48
  Speaker 9: values always had that ability to stay front and center,
• 13:51
  Speaker 9: being member focused and being patient focused. Because you know,
• 13:54
  Speaker 9: I don't have to tell you already know this. We
• 13:56
  Speaker 9: are very heavily involved, not just with PPA, but we're
• 14:00
  Speaker 9: also heavily involved at PPCN, which is the CPSN affiliate
• 14:03
  Speaker 9: of Pennsylvania. The you know, the the payer contracts that
• 14:08
  Speaker 9: we have through PPCN. Our guys they utilize them very well.
• 14:12
  Speaker 9: In girls, they utilize them very very well. And once
• 14:15
  Speaker 9: again it's if you're just focusing on product now you're
• 14:19
  Speaker 9: probably out of business.
• 14:20
  Speaker 3: Yep.
• 14:21
  Speaker 9: It has to be a more I don't want to
• 14:24
  Speaker 9: say wholesome model, but it has to be all encompassing.
• 14:27
  Speaker 9: That's what's really.
• 14:28
  Speaker 5: Making the difference.
• 14:29
  Speaker 9: So are you doing immunizations, are you pushing provider status?
• 14:33
  Speaker 9: Have you got your pharmacists signed up? You know, just recently,
• 14:36
  Speaker 9: you know, we just rolled out a technician training program
• 14:39
  Speaker 9: that's vital. How many technicians are in independent space. You know,
• 14:43
  Speaker 9: we have till June of next year, so you know,
• 14:45
  Speaker 9: staying in front of the issues that matter to just
• 14:47
  Speaker 9: our members, that also affect those members patients.
• 14:50
  Speaker 5: I think that's the uniqueness of Value Drug and.
• 14:54
  Speaker 1: The other uniqueness that I see from Value And I
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: think this is more coming from you than anyone on
• 14:58
  Speaker 1: the team, at least from my perspective. Is you always
• 15:01
  Speaker 1: invest in the schools of pharmacy, and I'm always seeing
• 15:05
  Speaker 1: you if you Decayanne, or I'm seeing you doing something
• 15:07
  Speaker 1: with pitt or seeing you do something that just gets
• 15:10
  Speaker 1: more knowledge to then to let them know that, hey,
• 15:14
  Speaker 1: it's not just retail, it's not just you know, community,
• 15:18
  Speaker 1: there's other things happening in pharmacy and it's and it's
• 15:21
  Speaker 1: bringing that business knowledge to those students at that P three,
• 15:25
  Speaker 1: P four level, so they really start using their imaginations
• 15:28
  Speaker 1: of where they're going to take their own careers.
• 15:30
  Speaker 10: Yeah.
• 15:31
  Speaker 9: The the fun part about that is I always say
• 15:33
  Speaker 9: it is to students. Everybody wants to get a six
• 15:35
  Speaker 9: figure paycheck, but they don't know where the six figures
• 15:38
  Speaker 9: are coming from.
• 15:39
  Speaker 5: It's true.
• 15:40
  Speaker 9: We try to educate them on you know, how do
• 15:43
  Speaker 9: you what's the profit look like? Prescript Some don't even
• 15:46
  Speaker 9: know where to look like on the adjudication where to
• 15:48
  Speaker 9: find that information. You know, to be sustainable, the business
• 15:53
  Speaker 9: has to be sustainable. And I think the biggest thing
• 15:56
  Speaker 9: with with students, and I'm not knocking academia, so it's
• 16:00
  Speaker 9: just sometimes that's not always taught on university.
• 16:03
  Speaker 5: True.
• 16:04
  Speaker 9: So when we have you know, whether it's appy rotations,
• 16:06
  Speaker 9: ap rotations, when we can get that, you know, when
• 16:09
  Speaker 9: we can get in front of those students, we do
• 16:11
  Speaker 9: do a lot of work on both sides of the state.
• 16:14
  Speaker 9: When we can get in front of those students and
• 16:16
  Speaker 9: let them know this is it, and you know, truthfully,
• 16:19
  Speaker 9: like when I went to school and when these kids
• 16:21
  Speaker 9: are going to school, you know, seventy percent used to
• 16:23
  Speaker 9: go into retail I go to his graduations. Seventy five
• 16:27
  Speaker 9: percent are going into residencies. So you know, how do
• 16:31
  Speaker 9: we flip that model? And you know, I always think,
• 16:33
  Speaker 9: like you know, the big buzzword on your residency side.
• 16:36
  Speaker 9: Everyone wants to do AM care.
• 16:37
  Speaker 5: I want to do am care.
• 16:39
  Speaker 9: You work at a community site, you're a provider, you
• 16:41
  Speaker 9: could sit down, you could actually talk to the patient.
• 16:44
  Speaker 9: Let's just say right now about you know twenty five
• 16:47
  Speaker 9: things that you might.
• 16:47
  Speaker 3: Be able to build.
• 16:49
  Speaker 9: You could do as you know, social determines of health.
• 16:52
  Speaker 9: You can follow up on maybe their diabetes or their
• 16:55
  Speaker 9: COPD asthma. It's kind of like AM care in a
• 16:59
  Speaker 9: community and you get to do that every day.
• 17:03
  Speaker 3: So you know, I.
• 17:04
  Speaker 9: Think the benefits of just saying that because the community
• 17:07
  Speaker 9: gets a bad rap, I don't have to tell you
• 17:09
  Speaker 9: why specifically what happen with right all the right A closures,
• 17:13
  Speaker 9: you know, with Walgreen's being sold to private equity, which
• 17:16
  Speaker 9: is probably more beneficial now than it was private previously.
• 17:19
  Speaker 11: But that's you know, so we at the end of
• 17:23
  Speaker 11: the day.
• 17:23
  Speaker 9: John to James, is going to retire sooner or later,
• 17:25
  Speaker 9: or it wants to or not. The future is who
• 17:28
  Speaker 9: we got to help get to the next level. I
• 17:30
  Speaker 9: had a lot of mentors to help me get to
• 17:32
  Speaker 9: where I am. You know, I love mentoring students, telling
• 17:35
  Speaker 9: them like about just the business world and how to
• 17:39
  Speaker 9: succeed in it.
• 17:40
  Speaker 1: Yeah, John to James, Value Drug appreciate you stopping by
• 17:43
  Speaker 1: at the NCPA's post show three part series being part
• 17:47
  Speaker 1: of this.
• 17:47
  Speaker 5: It's always good to talk.
• 17:48
  Speaker 3: To you, Always good to see you.
• 17:49
  Speaker 5: Todd.
• 17:50
  Speaker 9: Appreciate what you do for us and the professional Thank you.
• 17:55
  Speaker 2: Welcome to Real Value RX, a national NAVP accredited pharmaceutical
• 17:59
  Speaker 2: wholesale focused on helping pharmacies purchase smarter. We offer smarter
• 18:04
  Speaker 2: pricing and better margins with access to short data deals, closeouts,
• 18:08
  Speaker 2: and competitive generic pricing to protect your bottom line. We
• 18:11
  Speaker 2: look out for our independent and community pharmacies with flexible
• 18:15
  Speaker 2: ordering in net thirty terms, with direct access to over
• 18:18
  Speaker 2: one hundred and fifty manufacture relationships, reducing intermediaries and improving
• 18:23
  Speaker 2: product availability. Whether you're an independent pharmacy, a clinic, long
• 18:27
  Speaker 2: term care, or our regional chain, we're here to bring
• 18:30
  Speaker 2: your pharmacy real value. Learn more at realvaluarx dot com.
• 18:43
  Speaker 1: Double packed interview here with Jay Phipps and Stephanie Zimmerman.
• 18:47
  Speaker 1: Welcome to the Pharmacy Podcast Networks coverage of NCPA twenty
• 18:51
  Speaker 1: twenty five.
• 18:52
  Speaker 5: Jay, it's great to see.
• 18:53
  Speaker 11: Great to be here, always great to be with these
• 18:55
  Speaker 11: pharmacy gladiators in CPA.
• 18:57
  Speaker 5: Absolutely.
• 18:58
  Speaker 1: Stephanie, thank you so much for being one of our
• 19:01
  Speaker 1: sponsors this year. This is very important for us to
• 19:03
  Speaker 1: be able to get to these events and working with
• 19:06
  Speaker 1: Real Value has been a huge education for our organization,
• 19:09
  Speaker 1: but more importantly our listeners.
• 19:11
  Speaker 12: Thank you, Tod, thanks for having me.
• 19:13
  Speaker 5: Absolutely.
• 19:14
  Speaker 1: Hey, let's talk about the business of pharmacy. So things
• 19:18
  Speaker 1: have changed. I remember when I was trying to run
• 19:20
  Speaker 1: the pharmacy GPO small buying group for a little while,
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: and the difference between buying majority of your products from
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: a primary wholesaler, the strictness of the contracts. I jettisoned
• 19:36
  Speaker 1: myself ten years later, and it's a completely different universe
• 19:40
  Speaker 1: from a pharmacy owner's perspective. Jay, talk to me about
• 19:43
  Speaker 1: the balance now of primary secondary and some of the
• 19:48
  Speaker 1: strategy that goes into that.
• 19:50
  Speaker 11: I really think now you need every tool in your toolbox,
• 19:55
  Speaker 11: and so you know, we need primary hostsalers they have
• 19:58
  Speaker 11: they give us, you know, access to products that we
• 20:01
  Speaker 11: can get everywhere, and then secondary hostalers also give us
• 20:06
  Speaker 11: pricing and products and dating that we can get sometimes
• 20:09
  Speaker 11: through a primary hostaler. And we're in a very tight,
• 20:12
  Speaker 11: low margin business and because of that, we need to
• 20:16
  Speaker 11: be looking at all the avenues of revenue streams and
• 20:20
  Speaker 11: cost containment.
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: Stephanie, you're seeing this day in and day out. You've
• 20:26
  Speaker 1: been around long enough to understand some of the challenges
• 20:28
  Speaker 1: that our pharmacy owners are going through. Talk to us
• 20:31
  Speaker 1: about how real values stepping in as a strategic partner
• 20:34
  Speaker 1: and really helping profitability to return to the mix.
• 20:37
  Speaker 12: Yes, thanks Tom, Yeah, so I want everyone to know
• 20:42
  Speaker 12: about real value because what we have to offer. Yes,
• 20:46
  Speaker 12: we can save you money on your retail meds, your generics,
• 20:51
  Speaker 12: but we can actually help you make money and have
• 20:54
  Speaker 12: profitability on medications that you continually lose money on just
• 20:59
  Speaker 12: by a small vehicle change. And we take some higher
• 21:02
  Speaker 12: AWPs that's actually therapeutic for the patient, which is extremely
• 21:06
  Speaker 12: important to real value. But we do a small change
• 21:10
  Speaker 12: and then we work exclusively with a few manufacturers so
• 21:14
  Speaker 12: we can help you make money in that sense where uh,
• 21:18
  Speaker 12: there's you're actually profitable. You know met Foreman for instance,
• 21:23
  Speaker 12: a met Forman sixty five and a seven point fifty.
• 21:25
  Speaker 12: I always love to share my story with that, because
• 21:28
  Speaker 12: everyone fills a met Forman five hundred. We make what
• 21:32
  Speaker 12: Jay nothing A dollar? A doll Yeah, let's let's say
• 21:37
  Speaker 12: a dollar. So I mean you're making zero money, but
• 21:39
  Speaker 12: how often are you filling it? And you know, it's
• 21:44
  Speaker 12: something that the prescribers need to know about because what
• 21:47
  Speaker 12: we can do and what we do know is patients
• 21:52
  Speaker 12: are not compliant in taking their medications because of upset
• 21:55
  Speaker 12: stomach or things like that, and especially with metforman. So
• 21:58
  Speaker 12: what we have is a six five or seven fifty,
• 22:01
  Speaker 12: and if we could cut out a dose and help
• 22:04
  Speaker 12: them the patient become more compliant, then we're doing our
• 22:08
  Speaker 12: job as a pharmacist. As a pharmacy, we let the
• 22:11
  Speaker 12: physician know, which you know, real value has all of
• 22:14
  Speaker 12: the marketing material. We help you go to your physicians
• 22:17
  Speaker 12: so they can actually write or drugs that are actually
• 22:20
  Speaker 12: profitable for the pharmacy but then therapeutic for the patient.
• 22:24
  Speaker 1: Trying new things jay are not easy, and there's been
• 22:28
  Speaker 1: an entire emphasis as the Pharmacy Gladiator continues to bring
• 22:33
  Speaker 1: on new members and more people that understand what you're doing,
• 22:36
  Speaker 1: what you stand for. Change as a pharmacy owner is
• 22:39
  Speaker 1: sometimes just as scary.
• 22:41
  Speaker 5: Talk to us about some of the business business.
• 22:44
  Speaker 1: Issues that you've gone through as a pharmacy owner, that
• 22:46
  Speaker 1: you had to make some decisions to make a change,
• 22:49
  Speaker 1: and how uncomfortable maybe that was in getting there.
• 22:52
  Speaker 5: Yeah.
• 22:52
  Speaker 11: Absolutely, the fear of change is one of the biggest
• 22:55
  Speaker 11: things that people talk about. You know, if travel the
• 22:57
  Speaker 11: country on my Freedom fro Figure tour and you know,
• 22:59
  Speaker 11: people talk about things that get in their way and
• 23:02
  Speaker 11: how fear impacts them and their individuals, their teams and
• 23:04
  Speaker 11: their organizations, and really fear changes is really high at
• 23:09
  Speaker 11: that last up that list, probably only second to fear
• 23:12
  Speaker 11: of failure, which really seems to resonate with people. And
• 23:17
  Speaker 11: in the fear change. We just celebrated our twenty fifth
• 23:21
  Speaker 11: anniversary as a pharmacy I graduated pharmacy school, did residency
• 23:25
  Speaker 11: and opened my residency project was open to community, the
• 23:28
  Speaker 11: community pharmacy.
• 23:30
  Speaker 3: And so I started that twenty five years ago in June.
• 23:34
  Speaker 11: Small you know, fairly successful pharmacy. And after twenty five years,
• 23:41
  Speaker 11: I just picked up and we moved and so not
• 23:44
  Speaker 11: very far, but several miles down the road. We left
• 23:47
  Speaker 11: a safety net of a doctor's office where we knew
• 23:51
  Speaker 11: we had a certain amount of business and would always
• 23:53
  Speaker 11: have a certain amount of business. And now we moved
• 23:56
  Speaker 11: out what we call on the highway. You know, when
• 23:58
  Speaker 11: you're in small towns, you go from from little places
• 24:01
  Speaker 11: to out on the highway. And it took me forever.
• 24:05
  Speaker 11: I was frozen in fear. You know, fear impacts people
• 24:07
  Speaker 11: by fight, flight or freeze, and you're you're frozen in
• 24:10
  Speaker 11: that fear of change will keep you from taking a decision.
• 24:14
  Speaker 11: What we've seen is we've been in the new location
• 24:16
  Speaker 11: for a couple of months in the last since the
• 24:19
  Speaker 11: last quarter, we've run thirty percent since the move. So
• 24:23
  Speaker 11: like the potential is there, and you know, so it's
• 24:27
  Speaker 11: easy to look back and go, well, what kind of
• 24:29
  Speaker 11: I've done if I had done that earlier. Of course,
• 24:32
  Speaker 11: you just take advantage of the option.
• 24:33
  Speaker 3: You have now.
• 24:34
  Speaker 11: You can't do anything about what happened in the past.
• 24:36
  Speaker 11: You just you know, look back and go all right, well,
• 24:38
  Speaker 11: let's make decisions faster. And you know, from a business perspective,
• 24:43
  Speaker 11: whether that's you know, adding a program, innovating, you know,
• 24:46
  Speaker 11: adding a vendor, adding a new service, whatever that is.
• 24:52
  Speaker 11: I have found in my my flip your fear narrative
• 24:56
  Speaker 11: framework says make it fast, like make that decision evaluated.
• 25:00
  Speaker 11: And if you want to do business, if you want
• 25:01
  Speaker 11: to innovate, doing now, and if you if you want
• 25:06
  Speaker 11: to add a service, doing now, oh or don't do it.
• 25:08
  Speaker 3: It doesn't matter what the decision is.
• 25:10
  Speaker 11: But decide and so you know, keep the fear of
• 25:14
  Speaker 11: chain from from halting your progress and ultimately reaching your destiny.
• 25:21
  Speaker 1: Stephanie Phipps Pharmacy has four locations. You probably have lots
• 25:25
  Speaker 1: of clients out there that have that four, three, five, six.
• 25:29
  Speaker 1: Absolutely talk to me about bringing on Phipps Pharmacy. Not
• 25:33
  Speaker 1: a customer to become a customer, Talk to me about
• 25:35
  Speaker 1: that process.
• 25:36
  Speaker 5: How difficult is that? Oh my gosh, it's so easy.
• 25:39
  Speaker 12: I mean, so you sign up, of course, it doesn't
• 25:41
  Speaker 12: cost you anything. But then when you sign up, you
• 25:44
  Speaker 12: get complete access to our portal. You get access to
• 25:49
  Speaker 12: our portal to all of our medications, to all of
• 25:51
  Speaker 12: our flexible dosing items, and those are the higher AWP items.
• 25:57
  Speaker 5: And you know it's just and.
• 25:58
  Speaker 12: Then you have all of our mark the material. You
• 26:01
  Speaker 12: get access to an account executive that is assigned directly
• 26:05
  Speaker 12: to your account, and so we can can communicate to
• 26:08
  Speaker 12: the customer to the pharmacy any way you desire, which
• 26:12
  Speaker 12: would be a text or an email, or you can
• 26:14
  Speaker 12: order online. So actually we were just talking and Jay
• 26:19
  Speaker 12: is going to sign his four pharmacies up with us
• 26:22
  Speaker 12: and I and again we can make.
• 26:24
  Speaker 5: You money, save you money, and then.
• 26:27
  Speaker 12: And then just help you thrive because we're you know,
• 26:30
  Speaker 12: at the end of the day, there's not any industry
• 26:33
  Speaker 12: out there that is not allowed to make money. I mean,
• 26:36
  Speaker 12: it's we have to make money. We have to be profitable,
• 26:38
  Speaker 12: we have to pay our staff, we have to keep
• 26:40
  Speaker 12: moving and help those patients out there. So that's what
• 26:45
  Speaker 12: real value is all about. And I'm excited to say
• 26:49
  Speaker 12: Jay is going to to understand all of this because
• 26:52
  Speaker 12: we're going to be opening up his accounts and working
• 26:55
  Speaker 12: with him as well.
• 26:56
  Speaker 5: So if there's a fear of adding a new vendor.
• 26:59
  Speaker 5: We just got over it.
• 27:00
  Speaker 11: Yeah, we may just have to make sure we got
• 27:02
  Speaker 11: good video of this and make sure it's on It'll
• 27:04
  Speaker 11: be on TikTok before the week.
• 27:06
  Speaker 5: That's exactly great.
• 27:07
  Speaker 12: Yeah, so we're going to make it super simple for
• 27:09
  Speaker 12: day and and and it is anyway. I mean, it's
• 27:11
  Speaker 12: just basically signing a few things and getting you signed
• 27:16
  Speaker 12: up and then you have access to our portal where
• 27:18
  Speaker 12: you will see the real value that we have and offer.
• 27:23
  Speaker 1: Literally literally both of you have been friends of mine
• 27:26
  Speaker 1: for years. I love seeing people come together. I love
• 27:30
  Speaker 1: being a bridge builder and being able to do more
• 27:33
  Speaker 1: together because together our ex is like a whole motto
• 27:36
  Speaker 1: that I believe in, being able to make us not
• 27:39
  Speaker 1: only survive, but thrive so we can get to the
• 27:41
  Speaker 1: next level for our communities. Your community relies on you, Jay.
• 27:45
  Speaker 1: I know things that have happened in the past that
• 27:46
  Speaker 1: you were there for them, the big flood that happened
• 27:49
  Speaker 1: years ago. I love telling that story and how you
• 27:51
  Speaker 1: stood up Stephanie, your relationships. Every time I see somebody
• 27:56
  Speaker 1: come in the Real Value booth and you're giving them
• 27:58
  Speaker 1: a hug and they're looking at you and they're their
• 28:00
  Speaker 1: relationship with you like that's with the important part of this.
• 28:03
  Speaker 1: It's not necessarily I'm going to save you a bunch
• 28:05
  Speaker 1: of money. We're going to help you be profitable, but
• 28:07
  Speaker 1: you can rely on me and that's the type of
• 28:10
  Speaker 1: person that you are as well. So thank you guys
• 28:12
  Speaker 1: for being here on the show. I really appreciate it.
• 28:14
  Speaker 5: Todd, thank you, thanks so much.
• 28:15
  Speaker 11: Talk honored to be here.
• 28:22
  Speaker 13: Hi, this is Brad Gallagher from Barclay Damon, where you're
• 28:25
  Speaker 13: at the twenty twenty five NCBA Annual Convention and I'm
• 28:28
  Speaker 13: on the Pharmacy Podcast Network.
• 28:31
  Speaker 5: Thank hey, Brad, welcome to the show.
• 28:34
  Speaker 6: Welcome, thank you for having me.
• 28:35
  Speaker 5: Hey, it's good.
• 28:36
  Speaker 1: I've been watching you, following you, watching your firm grow
• 28:39
  Speaker 1: get into things through LinkedIn mostly. LinkedIn's such a great
• 28:43
  Speaker 1: platform just to hone out some of the noise that
• 28:46
  Speaker 1: you get on Twitter or Instagram or something. For the
• 28:50
  Speaker 1: most part, people stay on business. I have seen people
• 28:53
  Speaker 1: with their kids and their pictures and stuff like that,
• 28:55
  Speaker 1: and I'm like, that's all right, I guess once in
• 28:57
  Speaker 1: a while, But what do you think of using social
• 29:00
  Speaker 1: media and LinkedIn to get messaging out?
• 29:02
  Speaker 13: I think social media has been great. I use LinkedIn
• 29:04
  Speaker 13: a lot, as you know. I think LinkedIn's a great platform.
• 29:08
  Speaker 13: I think a lot of what you see on there
• 29:09
  Speaker 13: is up to date. It's instant, but it's also focused,
• 29:12
  Speaker 13: so you know, I try to focus on my connections
• 29:15
  Speaker 13: and stuff like that being in the pharmacy industry and
• 29:18
  Speaker 13: using that as a platform to engage with, you know,
• 29:20
  Speaker 13: clients or potential clients, and making sure that the information's
• 29:23
  Speaker 13: out there. So I think if you're following good and
• 29:26
  Speaker 13: reliable sources, it's a great way to know what's going
• 29:29
  Speaker 13: on out there instantaneously.
• 29:31
  Speaker 1: I know, it's my sense of news in some ways,
• 29:34
  Speaker 1: because I feel like my news comes from our profession
• 29:39
  Speaker 1: and the reason why I'm mentioning that something came up
• 29:42
  Speaker 1: with Astra Zenica, that you actually posted something on I
• 29:46
  Speaker 1: read something on and it was confusing to me, and
• 29:49
  Speaker 1: I was excited as a lawyer that you got to
• 29:51
  Speaker 1: come on and kind of give our listeners kind of
• 29:53
  Speaker 1: an update about how you worked on that and what
• 29:55
  Speaker 1: that meant.
• 29:56
  Speaker 6: Yeah.
• 29:57
  Speaker 13: So recently there's been letters going out to pharmacies across
• 30:00
  Speaker 13: the country on from Astersenica, making very threatening accusations about
• 30:05
  Speaker 13: purchasing and you know, basically demanding the pharmacies turnover information
• 30:13
  Speaker 13: from PBMs and the wholesalers to justify what's you know,
• 30:17
  Speaker 13: the bottom line issue is AstraZeneca paid rebates to bbms
• 30:21
  Speaker 13: and they believe they overpaid, right, and so now they're
• 30:23
  Speaker 13: going to come after the pharmacies and say where are
• 30:26
  Speaker 13: your purchases here? Right, we paid all these rebates. And
• 30:29
  Speaker 13: so those letters are coming out. There was an initial
• 30:31
  Speaker 13: round that what came out back in the summer. The
• 30:34
  Speaker 13: second round is out now. The second round letters are
• 30:37
  Speaker 13: much much more threatening and you know, from a legal perspective,
• 30:41
  Speaker 13: it's a very interesting issue because as pharmacy typically don't
• 30:46
  Speaker 13: have a direct contract with a manufacturer and this is
• 30:49
  Speaker 13: for sure true about astrosenica and these drugs that are
• 30:52
  Speaker 13: coming out, and so you know, the issue becomes is
• 30:55
  Speaker 13: what do you do as a pharmacy, Right do you respond?
• 30:58
  Speaker 13: Do you just hand over inform to them? You know,
• 31:02
  Speaker 13: and that it's a very interesting issue again because you're
• 31:05
  Speaker 13: not contracted.
• 31:06
  Speaker 3: Yeah, so and.
• 31:07
  Speaker 13: If you handed over that information, how do you do it?
• 31:10
  Speaker 13: You could be violating you know, Phi Hippa, you could
• 31:15
  Speaker 13: be violating your contracts with the PBMs. Generally and so
• 31:19
  Speaker 13: you know, knowing how to respond and what to do
• 31:22
  Speaker 13: and what it means for you if you don't respond. Uh,
• 31:25
  Speaker 13: those are all important things that you should be probably
• 31:27
  Speaker 13: talking to your legal counsel on.
• 31:29
  Speaker 1: Thank you for mentioning that and clarifying that, because it
• 31:32
  Speaker 1: was just confused as to what was going on and
• 31:34
  Speaker 1: I saw that all talk about it.
• 31:36
  Speaker 5: I found it on the news. The clarification is good.
• 31:40
  Speaker 13: So yeah, we're and just generally I'll add on to that.
• 31:43
  Speaker 13: This is, you know, something that we've been seeing more
• 31:45
  Speaker 13: and more out of manufacturers now. And you know, again
• 31:48
  Speaker 13: it's really you know, the manufacturers not paying you for
• 31:51
  Speaker 13: the drug, right, you're paying your wholesaler, but the manufacturers
• 31:54
  Speaker 13: are paying rebates and big rebates to PBMs, and so
• 31:59
  Speaker 13: you know it's a concern over money, right. But we're
• 32:02
  Speaker 13: seeing this tactic used by more and more manufacturers and
• 32:06
  Speaker 13: sending these threatening letters to independent pharmacies and you know,
• 32:11
  Speaker 13: knowing how to respond and what it means and what
• 32:13
  Speaker 13: information they may have or they may not have, you know,
• 32:17
  Speaker 13: considering the threats that they're making towards you, it's something
• 32:20
  Speaker 13: to be dealt with seriously.
• 32:22
  Speaker 1: If an owner does have one of those letters or
• 32:24
  Speaker 1: outreach from any manufacturer for that matter.
• 32:28
  Speaker 5: Should they reach out to you.
• 32:29
  Speaker 1: I mean, is that a time to actually say, hey,
• 32:31
  Speaker 1: we don't know what to do, we're just looking for
• 32:33
  Speaker 1: some advice.
• 32:33
  Speaker 13: Yes, absolutely, And you know sometimes that's a quick phone call, right,
• 32:37
  Speaker 13: it's not, you know, and it's something that can be
• 32:40
  Speaker 13: dealt with shortly, you know, quickly, depending on the type
• 32:43
  Speaker 13: of request, it may be something that you can respond
• 32:45
  Speaker 13: to and might be okay, or it may not be right.
• 32:50
  Speaker 13: And the seriousness of that, particularly if your pharmacy thinks
• 32:54
  Speaker 13: that they may have an issue, you know, you you
• 32:57
  Speaker 13: need to have proper legal advice and guidance on what
• 33:00
  Speaker 13: those responses should be and what the implications of those
• 33:02
  Speaker 13: responses may be, so you know, contacting a lawyer and
• 33:06
  Speaker 13: just getting to know your rights. And you know, for us,
• 33:09
  Speaker 13: like I'm happy to help independent pharmacies, I do it
• 33:12
  Speaker 13: all the time. And if I can give you a
• 33:14
  Speaker 13: quick five minute advice, like you know, this is how
• 33:16
  Speaker 13: to handle it. Or you have a serious or identifying
• 33:18
  Speaker 13: that you have an issue or that we do need
• 33:21
  Speaker 13: to respond to this and this is how we're going
• 33:22
  Speaker 13: to do it. You know, that's that's something that I'm
• 33:25
  Speaker 13: happy to do and have a quick call with someone
• 33:28
  Speaker 13: and just kind of walk them through what to expect
• 33:30
  Speaker 13: and then they make the decision rights as to how
• 33:32
  Speaker 13: they want to proceed.
• 33:33
  Speaker 1: All right, what do you project? And this this is
• 33:36
  Speaker 1: just your opinion, so but I'm curious. So pharmacy benefit
• 33:44
  Speaker 1: managers are going through changes, and they're good changes, definitely
• 33:50
  Speaker 1: in my opinion. Pharmacies are now being contacted, especially the
• 33:56
  Speaker 1: larger guys, to do direct relationships with manufacturers. I think
• 34:01
  Speaker 1: that that's going to continue. If that does continue, it does.
• 34:05
  Speaker 1: What's the dynamic there from a legal perspective, what should
• 34:07
  Speaker 1: pharmacists be thinking. Pharmacies be thinking about if should they
• 34:12
  Speaker 1: have a standard contract that they make the manufacturer sign
• 34:16
  Speaker 1: or is the manufacturer going to just be a Sherman
• 34:18
  Speaker 1: tank and say, you know, sign this or don't sign this.
• 34:22
  Speaker 13: Yeah, I mean, I think it just depends on the
• 34:24
  Speaker 13: size of the manufacturer. Certainly, from a manufacturer standpoint, if
• 34:27
  Speaker 13: you're contracting with a lot of pharmacies, you're going to
• 34:30
  Speaker 13: want a standard form that you use, and so that's
• 34:32
  Speaker 13: going to be pushed down. Now that being said, as
• 34:35
  Speaker 13: an independent pharmacy, you need to know under those under
• 34:38
  Speaker 13: those contracts, what your rights and obligations are. And just
• 34:42
  Speaker 13: because it's a big, big pharma right, big manufacturer, it
• 34:46
  Speaker 13: doesn't mean you should just sign the contract and not
• 34:49
  Speaker 13: know what's in there.
• 34:50
  Speaker 7: You know.
• 34:50
  Speaker 13: Unfortunately, that's what we've seen with PBMs, and that's where
• 34:52
  Speaker 13: kind of why we are where we are sometimes. So
• 34:56
  Speaker 13: you know, appropriate pushback, making sure you have appropriate rights
• 34:59
  Speaker 13: and knowing what your rights are under those contracts as
• 35:01
  Speaker 13: we see more of that model come out is important,
• 35:06
  Speaker 13: and you know, pushing back and approaching out appropriately. I
• 35:09
  Speaker 13: can say that we've done that and you know they're
• 35:12
  Speaker 13: willing to negotiate.
• 35:14
  Speaker 1: Hey, listen, listeners, we are going to have Brad's contact
• 35:18
  Speaker 1: information in the show notes. But Brad, if they're listening
• 35:21
  Speaker 1: right now and they're they're like, Hey, I'm a pharmacy owner.
• 35:23
  Speaker 5: I want to talk to this firm. Tell us how
• 35:26
  Speaker 5: to get a hold of you.
• 35:27
  Speaker 6: Yeah, so you can reach out to me.
• 35:28
  Speaker 13: I'm on LinkedIn, as you know, so you can always
• 35:31
  Speaker 13: reach out to me there via direct directly. If not,
• 35:34
  Speaker 13: you can always contact me via email. My email is
• 35:37
  Speaker 13: b Gallagher at barclay Damon dot com. And I'm gonna
• 35:40
  Speaker 13: I'll give you my personal cell phone. It's it's five
• 35:42
  Speaker 13: point eight six oh three nine six zero eight. Feel
• 35:46
  Speaker 13: free to text me or give me a call. It's
• 35:48
  Speaker 13: the easiest way and quickest way to get hold of me,
• 35:50
  Speaker 13: and I'll get back to you pretty quickly.
• 35:52
  Speaker 5: Thanks so much for being on the show.
• 35:53
  Speaker 13: Okay, thank you, thank you for having me.
• 35:55
  Speaker 3: It's been great.
• 36:00
  Speaker 1: Scotty Sykes here at NCPA twenty twenty five. Scotty, it's
• 36:03
  Speaker 1: good to see.
• 36:04
  Speaker 6: It's not always a pleasure.
• 36:05
  Speaker 5: I'm saying.
• 36:06
  Speaker 1: I was excited to get you on the show, and
• 36:09
  Speaker 1: I said to the marketing team, am I allowed to
• 36:12
  Speaker 1: talk to Scotty now that you're famous talking to Mark
• 36:14
  Speaker 1: Cuban and stuff like that.
• 36:16
  Speaker 14: Look, we're just here to help as many pharmacies as
• 36:19
  Speaker 14: we can, Todd, you know that, So I'll talk to anybody.
• 36:21
  Speaker 5: Oh I was, I'm just kidding. I love that. I mean,
• 36:23
  Speaker 5: that's that interview.
• 36:24
  Speaker 1: We're actually going to be publishing that upcoming and if
• 36:27
  Speaker 1: you have not heard that interview, you can go out
• 36:29
  Speaker 1: to just search Psychs and Company on YouTube probably find
• 36:33
  Speaker 1: it out there. But what an opportunity to talk to
• 36:35
  Speaker 1: somebody who is passionate about changing things and the same
• 36:40
  Speaker 1: whole philosophy of what PSYCHS has done over the years
• 36:43
  Speaker 1: and assuring the success of our community pharmacies based on
• 36:47
  Speaker 1: your pathways that you create for them in accounting.
• 36:50
  Speaker 5: Talk to me about that.
• 36:51
  Speaker 1: Talk to me about your being here at twenty NCPA
• 36:54
  Speaker 1: twenty twenty five. You're seeing any trends or are you
• 36:57
  Speaker 1: seeing any growth where it's like, Okay, now we need
• 37:00
  Speaker 1: to start paying attention to the back office and the
• 37:02
  Speaker 1: accounting of these organizations.
• 37:04
  Speaker 14: Well, some trends right now. Well, we have a whole
• 37:06
  Speaker 14: list of trends. KPIs key performance indicators. But things have
• 37:10
  Speaker 14: been holding pretty steady for pharmacy the past couple of
• 37:13
  Speaker 14: years in terms of margin and things like that. But
• 37:16
  Speaker 14: kind of what we're seeing now is pharmacies, you know,
• 37:19
  Speaker 14: really starting to branch out in other areas of revenue,
• 37:21
  Speaker 14: which they have to do. You know.
• 37:23
  Speaker 6: Unfortunately it's just a game we're all playing here.
• 37:27
  Speaker 14: But you know, we're seeing the MFP coming up soon,
• 37:29
  Speaker 14: so there's some conversation around that. What's that mean for
• 37:32
  Speaker 14: cash flow and how to prepare for that. So that's
• 37:35
  Speaker 14: kind of been a talking point here at this show.
• 37:39
  Speaker 14: And really it remains to be seeing what all is
• 37:41
  Speaker 14: going to happen there. Nobody really knows, so we're just
• 37:44
  Speaker 14: learning about it just as much as everybody else.
• 37:46
  Speaker 1: So all right, So long term care at home excites
• 37:50
  Speaker 1: me because it's another way for people to grow revenue
• 37:54
  Speaker 1: for services that they've already pretty much provided. There's some
• 37:57
  Speaker 1: new standards that they're gonna have to keep up with.
• 38:00
  Speaker 1: How's that changing things with regards to just being good
• 38:05
  Speaker 1: stewards of your business and accounting?
• 38:08
  Speaker 14: Well, I think, uh, you know, the pharmacies that are
• 38:11
  Speaker 14: doing long term care at home, Uh, that's a great thing.
• 38:14
  Speaker 14: I mean, you wanted to get to fifty hundred plus
• 38:16
  Speaker 14: patients to really see a difference in margin. But the
• 38:19
  Speaker 14: pharmacies that are not involved in it, you know, should
• 38:21
  Speaker 14: consider it because you're already serving those clients. And another
• 38:24
  Speaker 14: are patients rather And another reason they need to be
• 38:26
  Speaker 14: getting into us because the long term care at home
• 38:29
  Speaker 14: is not going away. I mean, these these individuals are
• 38:32
  Speaker 14: getting older. Uh, they're gonna be staying at home. There's
• 38:35
  Speaker 14: not enough beds, There's gonna be more. There has to
• 38:38
  Speaker 14: be more innovation and development and scale for these individuals
• 38:45
  Speaker 14: in the years ahead. Whatever that may look like. You'renot
• 38:48
  Speaker 14: just gonna let these people just you know, wither and
• 38:51
  Speaker 14: diet their homes. So there's gonna be some levels of
• 38:54
  Speaker 14: service that are gonna you know, come out of this
• 38:56
  Speaker 14: and payment so hopefully reimbursements things like that.
• 38:59
  Speaker 6: So go ahead and get it's started.
• 39:00
  Speaker 14: In that position your pharmacy to service those patients.
• 39:05
  Speaker 1: So if I'm a pharmacy owner and I kind of
• 39:08
  Speaker 1: know half of this answer, but not the other half,
• 39:10
  Speaker 1: and that is there have been bolt on businesses, for example,
• 39:14
  Speaker 1: Happier at Home, where it's a standalone business that's owned
• 39:18
  Speaker 1: by the pharmacy, it's a franchise, and then that works
• 39:21
  Speaker 1: alongside almost as a partner like you would with any
• 39:24
  Speaker 1: home care agency.
• 39:26
  Speaker 5: Really long term care at home.
• 39:29
  Speaker 1: Is that a business that you're saying, hey, maybe we
• 39:31
  Speaker 1: should set up a different division or a different LLC
• 39:34
  Speaker 1: or is it all happening under the same umbrella?
• 39:37
  Speaker 14: U you know, there's no you can do it separately.
• 39:40
  Speaker 14: You could do its own LLC, you know, get all
• 39:43
  Speaker 14: the NPI numbers, all that good stuff. You can certainly
• 39:46
  Speaker 14: do that separately, but most are just starting it under
• 39:50
  Speaker 14: their current retail umbrella. And that's part that's okay too,
• 39:54
  Speaker 14: you know, from an accounting tax standpoint where I sit,
• 39:56
  Speaker 14: it doesn't matter from a legal standpoint. You know, maybe
• 40:00
  Speaker 14: those are some discussions with the pharmacy attorneys out there.
• 40:03
  Speaker 6: That's a good question.
• 40:04
  Speaker 1: Yeah, absolutely, so Scotti, what's the what's.
• 40:08
  Speaker 14: The pharmacy attorneys they're if you're not working with one,
• 40:12
  Speaker 14: I mean, those are the ones you need to work with,
• 40:13
  Speaker 14: not your local attorneys.
• 40:14
  Speaker 1: We just interviewed Barclay and Brad Gallagher, so they've really
• 40:19
  Speaker 1: dialed into very specific things for pharmacy. I love it
• 40:22
  Speaker 1: and friar and love it, and then like all these
• 40:24
  Speaker 1: champions that are.
• 40:25
  Speaker 5: Out there, But what's next?
• 40:27
  Speaker 1: What do you think for where this is all going
• 40:31
  Speaker 1: community pharmacy. I think we're at between sixteen and eighteen
• 40:33
  Speaker 1: thousand throughout the country. What do you think's next?
• 40:38
  Speaker 5: Oh man, that's a good question, Todd.
• 40:41
  Speaker 6: I really don't know.
• 40:42
  Speaker 14: You know, I'm always an optimistic person, So I'm optimistic
• 40:47
  Speaker 14: something happens in Congress, the President in a positive manner
• 40:51
  Speaker 14: for pharmacies. Something's got to break because it's not like
• 40:55
  Speaker 14: you can just lose all these independence and.
• 40:58
  Speaker 5: Patients are stoke exactly.
• 40:59
  Speaker 14: So the more it gets, you know, down that path,
• 41:04
  Speaker 14: the more it's gonna cause an issue and awareness over
• 41:08
  Speaker 14: the issue. So I think momentums on the side. So
• 41:11
  Speaker 14: fixing the PBM side hopefully happens in the next year,
• 41:15
  Speaker 14: two years or something. You know, when Trump gets gets
• 41:17
  Speaker 14: around to this topic, you know, he picks and randomly,
• 41:21
  Speaker 14: he just picks something for the day, he goes after it,
• 41:24
  Speaker 14: you know, and if he can focus on the PBM
• 41:26
  Speaker 14: issue and then get Congress to kind of tag along
• 41:28
  Speaker 14: with it, because there's some bills in there. Buddy Carter's
• 41:30
  Speaker 14: got one he's sponsoring. You know, that's a big step forward.
• 41:35
  Speaker 14: But it's also at the same time, unfortunately, you know,
• 41:39
  Speaker 14: just the fill in the scripts.
• 41:40
  Speaker 6: Is not a business model anymore. It's got to be
• 41:42
  Speaker 6: those other.
• 41:43
  Speaker 14: Things, which is great because it opens up so many
• 41:45
  Speaker 14: other doors for a pharmacy. I mean, pharmacies are getting
• 41:48
  Speaker 14: patients in the door all day. You're touching these patients.
• 41:51
  Speaker 14: There's a lot of different services and wellness type services
• 41:55
  Speaker 14: you can add on to that somehow, some way find
• 41:57
  Speaker 14: that niche in your market.
• 42:00
  Speaker 6: Because patients, patients want it.
• 42:02
  Speaker 14: They don't want to go to a CVS and wait
• 42:04
  Speaker 14: and launch, or you know, they don't want to be
• 42:06
  Speaker 14: a number they want to they want service, you know,
• 42:09
  Speaker 14: and so there's there's those opportunities there.
• 42:11
  Speaker 6: You just gotta gotta get after it.
• 42:14
  Speaker 1: Scottie Sikes, Psychs and Company, This has been wonderful to
• 42:18
  Speaker 1: have some time with you here at the NCPA. Thanks
• 42:20
  Speaker 1: for stuffing Bak always. David Kirkis, We've got to stop
• 42:27
  Speaker 1: meeting like this. We're only the only time we see
• 42:30
  Speaker 1: each other at our conferences.
• 42:32
  Speaker 15: Well you know, uh, we're at a pharmacy conference together.
• 42:35
  Speaker 15: That means there's something good going on.
• 42:37
  Speaker 5: It's true.
• 42:38
  Speaker 3: Always happy to run into you one of these shows.
• 42:40
  Speaker 6: I know.
• 42:40
  Speaker 1: Primar X has been a client member of the Pharmacy
• 42:44
  Speaker 1: Podcast Network for about two years. Excellent content coming out
• 42:48
  Speaker 1: of the team. You and I have sat down several
• 42:51
  Speaker 1: times and talked about different things that are that are
• 42:54
  Speaker 1: being enhanced and changing and growing. One of the most
• 42:57
  Speaker 1: exciting things for me, someone who was in pharmacy software
• 43:01
  Speaker 1: in the beginning of my career in pharmacy, is now
• 43:04
  Speaker 1: the integration of the marketplace inside the system so that
• 43:10
  Speaker 1: there's nothing slowed down in workflow.
• 43:13
  Speaker 5: It's all interconnected.
• 43:15
  Speaker 1: I want you to describe that to our listeners that
• 43:18
  Speaker 1: are filling prescriptions and now they have access to product
• 43:21
  Speaker 1: in the workflow.
• 43:22
  Speaker 15: Yeah, we're super excited about the direction our marketplace is
• 43:27
  Speaker 15: going and now fully integrated into Primarx software. So if
• 43:31
  Speaker 15: you're using our pharmacy management system filling scripts all day long,
• 43:36
  Speaker 15: we are now directly connected with primarx market which is
• 43:40
  Speaker 15: our marketplace.
• 43:41
  Speaker 3: It's an e commerce platform where you can buy.
• 43:43
  Speaker 15: Pharmaceuticals direct from about forty five secondary wholesalers, and so
• 43:48
  Speaker 15: bringing that into workflow really takes the really simple experience
• 43:54
  Speaker 15: of searching and buying at a really good price on
• 43:56
  Speaker 15: our site and makes it completely seamless within your day
• 43:59
  Speaker 15: to day workfare. No more searching, no more pivoting out,
• 44:03
  Speaker 15: no more separate log ins. Literally every script you're filling
• 44:07
  Speaker 15: in workflow, we do a real time lookup of the
• 44:10
  Speaker 15: drug on the marketplace and immediately return the best price
• 44:13
  Speaker 15: available for that drug right now. No rebates, no GCRs,
• 44:18
  Speaker 15: no commitments, it's just buy the best product at the
• 44:21
  Speaker 15: best price right now and pay one net cost that's
• 44:25
  Speaker 15: going to save We see pharmacies shifting five to ten
• 44:28
  Speaker 15: percent of their purchases over to the marketplace, saving ten
• 44:31
  Speaker 15: plus thousand dollars per month. It's really it's life changing
• 44:35
  Speaker 15: money that you can save and now you don't even
• 44:38
  Speaker 15: have to think. You just the search is done, the
• 44:41
  Speaker 15: price is there, one click, you put the product into
• 44:43
  Speaker 15: your cart and your order comes the next day.
• 44:46
  Speaker 3: So we're excited about it.
• 44:48
  Speaker 15: Just launched a couple of weeks ago and happy to
• 44:52
  Speaker 15: talk to you and the rest of the pharmacy world
• 44:54
  Speaker 15: about it.
• 44:54
  Speaker 5: Happily, happily to have you talk about it.
• 44:57
  Speaker 1: Just returned from the primer x explore a user conference
• 45:03
  Speaker 1: in Jersey City. I was very proud to be part
• 45:06
  Speaker 1: of that. Was so impressed with your organization. Like I said,
• 45:10
  Speaker 1: a first time conference never comes off as well as
• 45:13
  Speaker 1: you guys had it doing, so shout out to the
• 45:15
  Speaker 1: marketing team.
• 45:17
  Speaker 5: The reason why I.
• 45:17
  Speaker 1: Was excited about that show is it gave us an
• 45:20
  Speaker 1: opportunity to speak to more of the business of pharmacy
• 45:23
  Speaker 1: and how technology is now becoming. It almost disappears behind
• 45:28
  Speaker 1: the scenes where it's just working as you would intended.
• 45:31
  Speaker 1: Whereas you know, back in the day, it was all
• 45:33
  Speaker 1: about is the API working? Is this over here working?
• 45:37
  Speaker 1: And so the seamlessness of primer X, It's come such
• 45:41
  Speaker 1: a long way and it's it's it's great to hear
• 45:43
  Speaker 1: the testimonies of your clients when I was there. We're
• 45:45
  Speaker 1: going to have a multi part series coming out from
• 45:48
  Speaker 1: that conference in a podcast form where we interviewed some people.
• 45:53
  Speaker 1: So excited to be a part of this. What what
• 45:55
  Speaker 1: about NCPA? What what's happening here? What are you what
• 45:59
  Speaker 1: are you looking forward to engaging with the pharmacy owners?
• 46:03
  Speaker 1: Talk to us a bit about being here in New Orleans.
• 46:06
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I think the show has been fantastic.
• 46:08
  Speaker 15: We're thrilled with the turnout and both both with the
• 46:11
  Speaker 15: pharmacy owners participation and the variety of vendors here. A
• 46:15
  Speaker 15: lot of real cutting edge solutions that we see. I've
• 46:19
  Speaker 15: made connections here for things that we'll take back and
• 46:21
  Speaker 15: think about.
• 46:22
  Speaker 3: That got my wheels turning.
• 46:23
  Speaker 15: For things that you know, you just don't necessarily think
• 46:27
  Speaker 15: about unless you're out on the floor talking to people
• 46:29
  Speaker 15: and a lot of great things going on. You know,
• 46:32
  Speaker 15: it's it's a hard time in retail pharmacy right now.
• 46:37
  Speaker 15: It's you know, margins are thinner than ever. I was
• 46:39
  Speaker 15: at a pharmacy last week looking at, you know, a
• 46:43
  Speaker 15: list of all transactions filled from the previous day, and
• 46:46
  Speaker 15: you know, the first eighty percent of those transactions sorted
• 46:49
  Speaker 15: by profitability.
• 46:51
  Speaker 3: Are all underwater.
• 46:53
  Speaker 15: And so you know, you have an owner who is
• 46:55
  Speaker 15: trying to keep his head above water, relying on enough
• 46:58
  Speaker 15: profit from twenty percent of business he conducts.
• 47:01
  Speaker 3: Every day to try to pull ahead of break even.
• 47:04
  Speaker 15: And it's just it's it's there's so much everything is
• 47:08
  Speaker 15: so opaque economically for retail pharmacies, and you know, we're
• 47:14
  Speaker 15: trying to do all we can to make it easier
• 47:17
  Speaker 15: for pharmacists, in particular to spend less time managing the
• 47:21
  Speaker 15: financials of the pharmacy and more time focused on patient
• 47:24
  Speaker 15: care with things like our marketplace, with the integrations.
• 47:27
  Speaker 3: That we have with so many different vendors, so we
• 47:30
  Speaker 3: can you know, we have solutions for anything.
• 47:32
  Speaker 15: That you want to do through our platform, either directly
• 47:35
  Speaker 15: embedded in workflow or through an API with all of
• 47:39
  Speaker 15: the various solutions providers that we work with. And you know,
• 47:46
  Speaker 15: I think more than anything, shopping competitively for pharmaceuticals is
• 47:53
  Speaker 15: really obviously I'm biased responsible for the market at primer X, but.
• 47:58
  Speaker 3: But we hear it all the time.
• 47:59
  Speaker 15: We heard it from from Mark I at our concert
• 48:01
  Speaker 15: at at our event last week talking about you know,
• 48:05
  Speaker 15: he came out of the event saying, if there's one
• 48:07
  Speaker 15: thing you leave this event with, it's go start shopping
• 48:10
  Speaker 15: on the market so you can save money and put
• 48:13
  Speaker 15: that money back into you know, your time as a pharmacist,
• 48:17
  Speaker 15: your patients.
• 48:18
  Speaker 3: The level of care you're able to provide.
• 48:20
  Speaker 15: The investments in your business to take on new opportunities
• 48:24
  Speaker 15: you want to start, you know, a new immunization service
• 48:26
  Speaker 15: or long term care at home, or whatever the opportunity is.
• 48:29
  Speaker 3: You know, use our tools to free up.
• 48:32
  Speaker 15: Your time so you can invest in those additional services,
• 48:36
  Speaker 15: and then use our resources on the purchasing side to
• 48:41
  Speaker 15: bring in you know, to save money. You're floating loans
• 48:44
  Speaker 15: to your primary wholesaler waiting for rebates when the overall
• 48:48
  Speaker 15: net cost of goods is still most likely higher post.
• 48:53
  Speaker 3: Rebate than it would be just buying.
• 48:55
  Speaker 15: The same product cheap or direct from one of the
• 48:58
  Speaker 15: wholesalers we have on our marketplace. So yeah, a lot
• 49:01
  Speaker 15: of great things going on and we're just getting started.
• 49:05
  Speaker 1: David kirkis PRIMARX. Great to have you on the NCPA
• 49:09
  Speaker 1: twenty twenty five show.
• 49:10
  Speaker 5: We appreciate you being here.
• 49:11
  Speaker 3: Thanks Todd always.
• 49:12
  Speaker 1: Pretty Hey, we're here with Evan Walker, what P.
• 49:20
  Speaker 5: Three, P.
• 49:21
  Speaker 3: Two.
• 49:21
  Speaker 5: I'm a P three, P. Three at the University of Pittsburgh.
• 49:24
  Speaker 5: Go Steelers, Go Steelers.
• 49:27
  Speaker 1: Tell us what your future plans are in the pharmacy field.
• 49:31
  Speaker 10: My future plans in the world pharmacy. I'm in a
• 49:34
  Speaker 10: community pharmacy convention. I guess i'd be obligator say community,
• 49:37
  Speaker 10: but I guess it's not even obligation.
• 49:39
  Speaker 5: I love community.
• 49:41
  Speaker 10: I could tell you exactly where that is. But as
• 49:43
  Speaker 10: long as it gives me a space where I can
• 49:44
  Speaker 10: work with people that in a place where I grew
• 49:46
  Speaker 10: up with then being able to make connections with those people,
• 49:49
  Speaker 10: I'm going to be happy.
• 49:51
  Speaker 1: Evan, this is your first time at the NCPA. We're
• 49:54
  Speaker 1: here in New Orleans, NCPA twenty twenty five. What's your
• 49:58
  Speaker 1: feeling of the conference so far? The whole vibe of
• 50:00
  Speaker 1: this is the super Bowl of independent committee.
• 50:02
  Speaker 10: Part it's the super Bowl of independent pharmacy. It's so
• 50:05
  Speaker 10: neat being able to see people from all across the
• 50:08
  Speaker 10: country come together, you know, it really just shows the
• 50:11
  Speaker 10: pharmacies are our only kind of Pittsburg, which I knew,
• 50:13
  Speaker 10: but across the country as well. Just seeing this network
• 50:17
  Speaker 10: of everybody being able to come together and speak with
• 50:19
  Speaker 10: each other, have the similar passions.
• 50:21
  Speaker 5: It's just been so wonderful to see and thanks for
• 50:24
  Speaker 5: being on the show. We hope that you're a subscriber
• 50:27
  Speaker 5: now to the PPM HO.
• 50:28
  Speaker 3: Of course,