Latest / Pharmacy Podcast Network / The Blueprint to Pharmacy Success in 2026 | Pharmacy Tech Trends: PrimeRx
Transcript
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- 0:50Speaker 1: Hey, welcome back to the Pharmacy podcast tech Trends. This
- 0:54Speaker 1: is sponsored by Primurx. It's wonderful to have Caden made
- 0:59Speaker 1: a back on the for twenty twenty six kicking this off.
- 1:03Speaker 1: I cannot believe, Kayden, it's already February. Are you kidding me?
- 1:08Speaker 1: And here we are and it's time to go. We're
- 1:12Speaker 1: already running down the track of the independent community pharmacy
- 1:16Speaker 1: and pharmacy in general and what AI is doing. But
- 1:19Speaker 1: it's so good to see you, Kayden. How are you? I?
- 1:22Speaker 4: Likewise, it's always fun to be over here. I think
- 1:26Speaker 4: it brings a natural style of thinking about like what
- 1:30Speaker 4: are the things happening, and you're right. I mean, the
- 1:32Speaker 4: time couldn't be better. It's twenty twenty six, and I
- 1:36Speaker 4: am already preparing for what should be the road map
- 1:40Speaker 4: for Q two, And I was like, wait, why are
- 1:42Speaker 4: we preparing for Q two. I'm like, oh my God,
- 1:44Speaker 4: Like March is already here, so it is. Time is
- 1:48Speaker 4: going fast, so is technology, so our rules, so our changes.
- 1:53Speaker 1: I'm excited about who's joining us today because doctor Lisa
- 1:57Speaker 1: Schwartz has had her finger on the pulse of policy
- 2:01Speaker 1: and technology and strategy in the realm of independent community
- 2:07Speaker 1: pharmacy and the evolution of where that's going and payment
- 2:11Speaker 1: models and just welcome to the show, Lisa. It's so
- 2:14Speaker 1: good to see you again. It's so good to have you.
- 2:16Speaker 5: Thank you so much. I'm glad to be here.
- 2:19Speaker 1: All right, Lisa, you are the senior director over at
- 2:22Speaker 1: the National Community Pharmacist Association, the NCPA. I'm going to
- 2:27Speaker 1: start with you. It's a brand new year. It's a
- 2:29Speaker 1: good time to think about what direction we're going in.
- 2:32Speaker 1: What's the blueprint for success in independent community pharmacy. Share
- 2:37Speaker 1: with us a little bit about your vision for twenty
- 2:39Speaker 1: twenty six in our independence out there.
- 2:42Speaker 5: Well, we're pretty excited.
- 2:44Speaker 2: We've had some bills that have been before Congress iterations
- 2:50Speaker 2: the last several sessions, and just the update that I
- 2:55Speaker 2: got from the Advocacy Center this morning helping prepare for
- 2:59Speaker 2: this podcast. We're excited that it looks like some Medicare
- 3:03Speaker 2: reform is finally going to move forward. It's never been controversial,
- 3:09Speaker 2: but it just hasn't found the right package to advance.
- 3:12Speaker 5: So we're seeing there's uh, it was not a like.
- 3:17Speaker 2: Smooth progression because one of the one of the funding
- 3:21Speaker 2: bills actually got pulled out before the Senate voted on it.
- 3:25Speaker 2: They're going to handle that in a different process, I guess.
- 3:30Speaker 2: But the remaining funding bills and and the this Medicare
- 3:36Speaker 2: Part D reform is part of that will go back
- 3:39Speaker 2: to the House. They have to they have to re
- 3:42Speaker 2: kind of redo their vote because one of the funding
- 3:44Speaker 2: bills was pulled out of the package. And we're we're
- 3:47Speaker 2: expecting that to be pretty straightforward and to pass and
- 3:52Speaker 2: to finally be able to move and have Medicare to
- 3:57Speaker 2: have CMS define what reasonable and real and reimbursement looks like.
- 4:01Speaker 2: For Part D to have oversided a little bit more transparency,
- 4:06Speaker 2: to have a definition of what a essential retail pharmacy is,
- 4:14Speaker 2: in shoring up what access looks like for underserved communities
- 4:19Speaker 2: that don't have good pharmacy access across the country. Those
- 4:22Speaker 2: are all things that we're looking forward to, you know,
- 4:27Speaker 2: saying we've been we've been putting a lot of effort
- 4:30Speaker 2: behind getting those getting good sponsorship, support and hopefully finally passage.
- 4:36Speaker 2: So that's I mean, that's kind of the bright shining
- 4:40Speaker 2: star in the first quarter of our year this year.
- 4:43Speaker 2: And we have our Congressional Pharmacy fly in coming up
- 4:47Speaker 2: in April, so I think there will be a lot
- 4:50Speaker 2: of a lot of hopefully there'll be a lot of
- 4:53Speaker 2: happy folks there, but with the ability to look at
- 4:56Speaker 2: sort of what's next and maybe maybe to have some
- 5:01Speaker 2: like thank you conversations when they make appointments and fewer
- 5:05Speaker 2: of the like pass it already conversations.
- 5:09Speaker 1: I love hearing Lisa.
- 5:10Speaker 4: I love hearing that, Like I know you you said
- 5:14Speaker 4: that you were excited about Lisa, like I want to
- 5:16Speaker 4: share in that as well. You know, I think there
- 5:19Speaker 4: is not a single tech vendor in the industry who
- 5:23Speaker 4: does not know Lisa, or who Lisa has not communicated
- 5:26Speaker 4: with right. One of the reasons why it is really
- 5:31Speaker 4: she brings in a lot of these different kinds of
- 5:33Speaker 4: things that the pharmacies are going through. It does not
- 5:36Speaker 4: have to be necessarily technical, but she's keeping all the
- 5:39Speaker 4: tech vendors and the general industry aware about this. So, Lisa,
- 5:43Speaker 4: I mean, I just wanted to you know, on behalf
- 5:46Speaker 4: of all the tech vendors for sure, I just wanted
- 5:49Speaker 4: to thank you. I'm like, you bring a wealth of
- 5:51Speaker 4: information that we all rely on.
- 5:54Speaker 2: Well, this is such an I mean, it is integral
- 5:58Speaker 2: part of community pharmacy practice. And as I say integol,
- 6:01Speaker 2: I'm also picking like picturing the little proteins and the
- 6:04Speaker 2: cell membrane, like there's you can't you know, pharmacy can't exist,
- 6:13Speaker 2: Like our cell.
- 6:13Speaker 5: Membrane would explode if we.
- 6:16Speaker 2: Didn't have, you know, a solid backbone and we didn't
- 6:21Speaker 2: have that like protein structure of the dispensing system. Vendors
- 6:25Speaker 2: helping us keep our records straight, sending real time claims,
- 6:29Speaker 2: doing the prescribing transactions, and then sort of all of
- 6:33Speaker 2: the other bells and whistles that you all are able
- 6:36Speaker 2: to support in our member stores.
- 6:39Speaker 4: Absolutely, I mean, like I remember you know, the MVP
- 6:43Speaker 4: and the MFP and all those kind of things that
- 6:46Speaker 4: actually have I mean, strangely enough, it looks like we
- 6:49Speaker 4: were talking about it all the time and now they
- 6:50Speaker 4: are actually into practice. And the thing is that NCP
- 6:55Speaker 4: has done such a good job of communicating that between
- 6:58Speaker 4: the NCPDP tech vendors and the pharmacists because most of
- 7:02Speaker 4: the farmacies are busy running their businesses right and like
- 7:05Speaker 4: dealing with all these challenges and most sometimes what happens
- 7:10Speaker 4: is we come to know about these regulations from the
- 7:13Speaker 4: pharmacist in the nick of time when they're going to
- 7:15Speaker 4: be implemented and we're like, wait, what is that? But
- 7:18Speaker 4: with you filling in those gaps, it has really become
- 7:21Speaker 4: advantages and we have been able to deploy the changes
- 7:25Speaker 4: much more effectively with reporting and then also use you
- 7:29Speaker 4: as a sounding board to say, hey, how do pharmacists
- 7:31Speaker 4: look at this rule versus that? And like it really
- 7:34Speaker 4: has been a good union.
- 7:36Speaker 5: So the collaboration is very much appreciated.
- 7:40Speaker 2: You know, I have my experience behind the counter is
- 7:44Speaker 2: now like seventeen years distant, but I do hang out
- 7:49Speaker 2: with like one of my roles at NCPA is the
- 7:53Speaker 2: staff liaison for the NCPA Technology Committee, and so that's
- 7:57Speaker 2: a group of members that are very interested and leveraging
- 8:00Speaker 2: technology to make both their business efficient but also their
- 8:05Speaker 2: pharmacy practice efficient and high quality.
- 8:09Speaker 5: And so having them as the sounding.
- 8:11Speaker 2: Board as well, it just is it's it's honestly, it's
- 8:15Speaker 2: fun to be the person that gets to interact with
- 8:18Speaker 2: the technology vendors, but then also the technology enthusiast pharmacists.
- 8:25Speaker 1: I think it's really cool, Lisa that you said, this
- 8:29Speaker 1: is an opportunity for thanks where we always when we're
- 8:32Speaker 1: going to Washington, d C. I was down with a
- 8:35Speaker 1: whole bunch of pharmacists during the Pharmacist Fight Back Act
- 8:40Speaker 1: that was proposed, and NCPA was there too, of course,
- 8:44Speaker 1: and for you to say, hey, we're going to do
- 8:46Speaker 1: a fly in it's time to continue the fight April
- 8:50Speaker 1: fifteenth through sixteenth in Washington, d C. And this is
- 8:54Speaker 1: a chance, obviously to get your voice heard, but it's
- 8:57Speaker 1: also a chance to say thank you to those legs
- 9:00Speaker 1: laders who have really jumped in. Jake Auchenklass and so
- 9:03Speaker 1: many of the of our reps, state representatives and state
- 9:07Speaker 1: senators and federal level that they finally understand I feel
- 9:12Speaker 1: like I feel like this is the first time since
- 9:15Speaker 1: I entered pharmacy that they really get it, and they're
- 9:19Speaker 1: digging into the data and they're leveraging the knowledge, and
- 9:23Speaker 1: they're comparing it back to their Medicaid budgets, and they're
- 9:26Speaker 1: comparing it back to the impact of federal level Medicare
- 9:30Speaker 1: party and they're seeing what's making sense, what isn't making sense,
- 9:34Speaker 1: how the status quo is breaking our healthcare system from
- 9:39Speaker 1: from the inside out. And now with all of this clarity,
- 9:44Speaker 1: I feel like we are truly on the edge of
- 9:48Speaker 1: building a new pharmacy care model and how it will
- 9:51Speaker 1: be paid for, and how pharmacists are going to be
- 9:54Speaker 1: leveraged to pull more data into clinical assessment drive of
- 10:01Speaker 1: the entire treatment and I see the pharmacists becoming much
- 10:05Speaker 1: more involved in the chronic management than ever before, and
- 10:11Speaker 1: how tech kind of sets up for that. And I'm
- 10:13Speaker 1: so glad you shot out shouted out NCPDP as well,
- 10:16Speaker 1: because setting up how to collect the data, how to
- 10:20Speaker 1: exchange the data, how to leverage the data from all
- 10:23Speaker 1: the EHRs, and then getting pharmacists in front of it,
- 10:26Speaker 1: this is seriously an exciting time. I know when you
- 10:29Speaker 1: get punched in the face as many times as the
- 10:32Speaker 1: pharmacist and our independent community pharmacies do, to the point
- 10:36Speaker 1: that some of them, you know, went out of business unfortunately,
- 10:39Speaker 1: just over the years. This is the time where we're
- 10:42Speaker 1: seeing we're building a brand new ship and it's it's different,
- 10:47Speaker 1: and I can I can feel the momentum growing. So
- 10:50Speaker 1: I was so excited to see the fly in. I
- 10:53Speaker 1: think it's going to be a celebration fly in in April.
- 10:55Speaker 1: But I was also excited to see the NCPDP data
- 10:59Speaker 1: come out and really getting the attention of Wall Street,
- 11:03Speaker 1: where we're saying, hey, independence make up one hundred and
- 11:06Speaker 1: three billion dollars of revenue in twenty twenty four. Talk
- 11:11Speaker 1: to our listeners a little bit about all of those components.
- 11:14Speaker 1: I know, I threw a lot of ingredients at you
- 11:16Speaker 1: all at once.
- 11:18Speaker 5: One of my.
- 11:20Speaker 2: Department home at the Association is policy and for policy
- 11:24Speaker 2: and pharmacy Affairs, and so I do a little bit
- 11:28Speaker 2: of the straddle between pharmacy practice and then what we're
- 11:33Speaker 2: seeing and legislation that's likely to be passed or the
- 11:37Speaker 2: rulemaking that's going to happen once we have a law passed.
- 11:42Speaker 2: But one of my interesting projects that gets used by
- 11:47Speaker 2: just about everybody in the building is the NCPA Digest,
- 11:51Speaker 2: which is sponsored by Cardinal Health every year.
- 11:54Speaker 5: It's a huge amount of work to.
- 11:57Speaker 2: Get like to collect the data that we use in
- 12:01Speaker 2: the digest. It's a long survey that I'm very grateful
- 12:05Speaker 2: for the number of pharmacies that filled that out and
- 12:08Speaker 2: send that in. We do our survey collection in like
- 12:12Speaker 2: May and June every year, so hugely important, hugely.
- 12:16Speaker 5: Helpful for us.
- 12:17Speaker 2: That's where we're able to say we know that the
- 12:20Speaker 2: average pharmacy has about five point four million dollars in revenue.
- 12:25Speaker 2: We know that there are eighteen nine hundred and some
- 12:29Speaker 2: independent pharmacies out there, so you know, you know a
- 12:33Speaker 2: times b We understand that there's a huge economic impact
- 12:38Speaker 2: that is the result of independent pharmacies existing. We see
- 12:43Speaker 2: click go one more do we get the one two more?
- 12:51Speaker 5: Knew?
- 12:51Speaker 2: This year we added a section about pharmacy. About Pharmacy
- 12:57Speaker 2: Access Initiative, a collaboration between University's Southern California and NCPA.
- 13:03Speaker 2: We wanted to help folks have a good visual for
- 13:06Speaker 2: what parts of the country have good access to a
- 13:09Speaker 2: brick and mortar pharmacy. There are certainly times where having
- 13:15Speaker 2: medications delivered by mail help folks get by. But being
- 13:20Speaker 2: able to go and get a prescription filled as soon
- 13:25Speaker 2: as you need it and you address any issues with
- 13:29Speaker 2: is this right, medication interactions, allergies and some of those
- 13:33Speaker 2: mistakes still sneak through on the prescriptions. But you know,
- 13:38Speaker 2: there are parts of the country, and I'm even thinking
- 13:42Speaker 2: of where I have family In northern Minnesota, our local
- 13:46Speaker 2: post office doesn't do the sorting anymore. The sorting happens
- 13:51Speaker 2: and it's either Saint Cloud or Fargo, which is like
- 13:53Speaker 2: a good two hours away from where my folks live.
- 13:57Speaker 2: So for them, having independent pharmacy in town is very important.
- 14:01Speaker 2: I'm glad that that owner is there. I know he
- 14:04Speaker 2: takes good care of my parents. But they circle back.
- 14:10Speaker 2: The NCPA digest I think, is an incredibly useful report
- 14:14Speaker 2: that we put together every year and really helps us
- 14:16Speaker 2: understand what all is going on in our members' stores.
- 14:21Speaker 5: I guess.
- 14:21Speaker 2: In preparing for this podcast, we talked a little bit
- 14:24Speaker 2: about one of the interesting trends that we're seeing. We
- 14:27Speaker 2: have long seen that independent pharmacies dispense medications to patients
- 14:32Speaker 2: who live in skilled nursing facilities or assisted living facilities
- 14:37Speaker 2: long term care. But we're also really starting to see
- 14:41Speaker 2: that patients are getting these pharmacy services, long term care
- 14:45Speaker 2: pharmacy services at their home. So we've added a whole
- 14:49Speaker 2: program into our long term care division to help folks
- 14:52Speaker 2: understand what's required to offer long term care pharmacy services
- 14:57Speaker 2: to patients who are at their home. You know, it's
- 14:59Speaker 2: not just putting them in packaging and delivering them. There
- 15:02Speaker 2: are other services that wrap around to qualify and be
- 15:06Speaker 2: long term care services.
- 15:08Speaker 5: So we know we forgot about it is mark my
- 15:13Speaker 5: page here.
- 15:14Speaker 2: Fifty five percent of our members said that they do
- 15:17Speaker 2: some sort of long term care services.
- 15:20Speaker 5: But we also know that there's a.
- 15:23Speaker 2: Range that skilled nursing facilities, assists in living facilities, might
- 15:27Speaker 2: be correctional facilities. And we've also seen the number of
- 15:31Speaker 2: beds that people are taking care of patients in their
- 15:34Speaker 2: home row.
- 15:35Speaker 5: By quite a bit.
- 15:36Speaker 2: So I think that's a really good opportunity something that
- 15:40Speaker 2: moving forward. A lot of pharmacies oners see long term
- 15:44Speaker 2: care services as a very important part of their business
- 15:48Speaker 2: model and source of revenue.
- 15:50Speaker 4: To be honest, Yeah, and thought you did join a
- 15:55Speaker 4: lot you know, there's something about mention about clinical services
- 15:59Speaker 4: and I think are referred to it as well. You know,
- 16:02Speaker 4: there's long term, there's long term care pharmacies in our
- 16:07Speaker 4: network also, they have started utilizing this and the ability
- 16:11Speaker 4: to provide clinical services is something that the pharmacistst coach for. However,
- 16:17Speaker 4: in the day to day process of managing and running
- 16:20Speaker 4: the business, sometimes they miss out on the opportunity because
- 16:24Speaker 4: the mindset coached for all these decades is still into
- 16:29Speaker 4: a fill in bill mode. So pharmacies that actually utilize
- 16:35Speaker 4: you know, appropriate ihurocation or diversification within their businesses, they
- 16:40Speaker 4: trend to thrive more because obviously because of profits. You know,
- 16:45Speaker 4: the way that they get rembursed on LTC claim versus
- 16:48Speaker 4: a regular claim, and then the way they get reimbursed
- 16:51Speaker 4: for long term get at home services or a clinical
- 16:54Speaker 4: service sources a regular blood pressure medication that they are
- 16:57Speaker 4: transmitting is completely different. And this is where I think
- 17:00Speaker 4: that the tech vendors can actually really them, Like, so,
- 17:07Speaker 4: is there really in today's day and age with automation, AI,
- 17:11Speaker 4: data hands is all behind this, is there really a
- 17:14Speaker 4: need for them to be processing electronic prescription? So what
- 17:18Speaker 4: are the things that we can do to map out
- 17:21Speaker 4: a prescription that is coming electronically with the right data
- 17:25Speaker 4: that's in your pharmacy, with the inventory, and then essentially
- 17:29Speaker 4: reduce the time for them to process a perscription and
- 17:32Speaker 4: the time that is saved can be used into those
- 17:35Speaker 4: clinical services. Right. So we have actually launched complete automated
- 17:43Speaker 4: processes and pharmacies that are actually utilizing them are saving.
- 17:49Speaker 4: You know, there's various levels of tolean instead of pharmacy
- 17:52Speaker 4: may want so from complete automation to partial automation, but
- 17:55Speaker 4: on an average they'll save at least thirty five to
- 17:58Speaker 4: forty percent of from the prescriptions that they would normally
- 18:01Speaker 4: filled by using automation. And we've seen that data just
- 18:05Speaker 4: in the initial stages, and I think we are trying
- 18:09Speaker 4: to gather more and more of like what is it
- 18:11Speaker 4: that we can do to automate? So the intent is
- 18:14Speaker 4: save time, make rescription filling utility, and utilize the time
- 18:20Speaker 4: to train your staff to provide those clinical services and
- 18:24Speaker 4: generate the care plans and generate the medical building, right,
- 18:26Speaker 4: because that's where I think the growth is moving towards.
- 18:29Speaker 4: And I think that the digest that a cardinal has
- 18:34Speaker 4: graciually graciously been sponsoring for all these years shows that
- 18:39Speaker 4: trend where the pharmacies that move into that kind of services,
- 18:44Speaker 4: they are the ones that are driving more So, there's
- 18:46Speaker 4: literally a shift in the industry where everybody has to
- 18:49Speaker 4: understand and adjust onto where they should be focusing their
- 18:53Speaker 4: efforts are.
- 18:54Speaker 2: And sometimes the inertia is like I know, you know,
- 18:59Speaker 2: if hypothetical pharmacy owner, I know that my dispensing system
- 19:04Speaker 2: was support has the technology for me to do this better?
- 19:09Speaker 2: I've been working with customers before me, people that are
- 19:12Speaker 2: at the you know, like my technology committee, that are demanding,
- 19:16Speaker 2: like I need this support, make it happen, And eventually
- 19:19Speaker 2: rolls down to the average pharmacy owner who's like, yeah,
- 19:23Speaker 2: I really need to figure this out now. Some of
- 19:26Speaker 2: the innership comes over what how do I actually change
- 19:30Speaker 2: my workflow?
- 19:32Speaker 5: What staffing?
- 19:34Speaker 2: How to identify somebody who's on staff who's going to
- 19:36Speaker 2: be good at this particular role or this particular role,
- 19:40Speaker 2: cross training them and a few years back, the Community
- 19:45Speaker 2: Pharmacy Foundation gave a grant for Flip the Pharmacy, and
- 19:49Speaker 2: through several cohorts of training groups of pharmacists, we helped them,
- 19:55Speaker 2: you know, identify digestible bites of their workflow to tackle.
- 20:02Speaker 5: Those materials are still online.
- 20:04Speaker 2: You don't need to be part of a flip the
- 20:07Speaker 2: pharmacy cohort to go out and look at the materials
- 20:10Speaker 2: and you decide to work with your staff on doing
- 20:13Speaker 2: some practice transformation to make sure that you have if
- 20:17Speaker 2: you have the technology that supports freeing up this time,
- 20:22Speaker 2: that you do it in a way that's smart. So
- 20:25Speaker 2: the time isn't minutes here and there, it's a half
- 20:28Speaker 2: hour here and there where you can actually do some
- 20:31Speaker 2: focused work or start making some patient appointments.
- 20:36Speaker 4: I think we can do chick vendors. We can actually
- 20:40Speaker 4: do a better job at that.
- 20:41Speaker 1: Right.
- 20:41Speaker 4: That means what I'm trying to say is, yeah, we
- 20:44Speaker 4: have had all these features and functions for so many years, right,
- 20:48Speaker 4: but we were still focused on filling the need for
- 20:51Speaker 4: fill and build. The reason is because that's what majority
- 20:53Speaker 4: of the finnacies were doing. Right. So, yeah, you want
- 20:55Speaker 4: to generate a medical building file, Okay, you can click
- 20:58Speaker 4: here do this. You want to generate a chare or
- 21:00Speaker 4: a clinical documentary, we can click here do this. So
- 21:02Speaker 4: why all these options are available, we could actually do
- 21:05Speaker 4: a better job of bringing them into the workflow along
- 21:08Speaker 4: with the automation, so that way they don't have to
- 21:11Speaker 4: remember to go and do something. It should be a
- 21:13Speaker 4: part of their natural filling process workflow. So the fill
- 21:16Speaker 4: in bill should include the ability to identify a new therapy,
- 21:19Speaker 4: the ability to generate automated care plans, the ability to
- 21:22Speaker 4: generate automatic automated building medical billing files. We should be
- 21:27Speaker 4: able to integrate with the vendors that specialize in those
- 21:31Speaker 4: kind of scenarios that are actually helping the finacies and
- 21:33Speaker 4: then just keep on moving in that direction. And I
- 21:35Speaker 4: think there is room for improvement and there's a lot
- 21:39Speaker 4: of opportunity over there where VS techvendors can provide that
- 21:42Speaker 4: or bridge that gap. Rather.
- 21:47Speaker 1: I'm excited, Lisa, what I'm hearing from pharmacy owners and
- 21:51Speaker 1: they're rolling out new programs that I've never heard pharmacists
- 21:55Speaker 1: managing before. It all started with immunization programs and extension
- 22:01Speaker 1: of long term care at home services. I heard more
- 22:05Speaker 1: about remote remote patient monitoring systems and services that they're
- 22:09Speaker 1: getting reimbursed for. And now I'm hearing about testing. I'm
- 22:13Speaker 1: here about allergy management, contraception. I'm hearing about all these
- 22:19Speaker 1: other services where we've always said that the community pharmacy
- 22:24Speaker 1: was that healthcare hub of their community, but it literally is.
- 22:28Speaker 1: I mean everything that's cultivating, everything's being tied in. It's
- 22:33Speaker 1: not really about the prescription anymore standing alone. It's like
- 22:37Speaker 1: that's a component of a bigger picture of what are
- 22:41Speaker 1: community pharmacies are going to be able to dial into.
- 22:43Speaker 1: And then you have the superduper stars that are then saying, hey,
- 22:48Speaker 1: i want a physician assistant to be assigned to a
- 22:53Speaker 1: clinic style environment where I'm actually offering general health care
- 22:59Speaker 1: services that are a business that's attached to my pharmacy.
- 23:02Speaker 1: And then long term care at home is opening deeper
- 23:06Speaker 1: doors for bringing in light bathing and shopping and like
- 23:13Speaker 1: having those home care services that are now being embedded.
- 23:17Speaker 1: So I this is this realm and this part of healthcare,
- 23:23Speaker 1: which is the long term, that long term effect in education.
- 23:28Speaker 1: It's coming from our independent community pharmacy. It's going to
- 23:32Speaker 1: be a whole different looking business. You know, five ten
- 23:36Speaker 1: years from now.
- 23:39Speaker 2: That the truth I'm thinking of things, you know, the
- 23:44Speaker 2: different services that you would listen off and having a
- 23:47Speaker 2: co located health clinic, you know, that's something that we've
- 23:51Speaker 2: talked about for years. Members here and there, you know,
- 23:55Speaker 2: ones and twos figure it out, but finding that scalable
- 24:01Speaker 2: model has been something that is still super interesting, especially
- 24:05Speaker 2: for some of the pharmacy shortage areas where it's a
- 24:08Speaker 2: pharmacy shortage area and if a pharmacy were to open up, great,
- 24:14Speaker 2: that addresses access to prescription medications. But there might also
- 24:18Speaker 2: it's a really good chance actually that it's also a
- 24:21Speaker 2: primary care shortage area. So even some of the things
- 24:26Speaker 2: that are in scope for pharmacists to do can address
- 24:29Speaker 2: some of those primary care gaps. But the opportunity to
- 24:34Speaker 2: have you know, sort of a mid level practitioner there
- 24:36Speaker 2: as well, super super exciting.
- 24:43Speaker 1: It really is, Kayden. We've set the stage over the
- 24:47Speaker 1: years of building a system that is now like a
- 24:51Speaker 1: Lego machine that you just snap on the next thing
- 24:54Speaker 1: in the you know, on the legos, so that you
- 24:56Speaker 1: can actually execute. Talk to us a little bit of
- 25:00Speaker 1: about the realm of artificial intelligence and where AI ties
- 25:04Speaker 1: into the success of our independent community pharmacies.
- 25:10Speaker 4: Yes, so we have actually started working on the there
- 25:15Speaker 4: are three passages to AI. From where we stand, we
- 25:19Speaker 4: see that AA can actually help the pharmacy if you
- 25:22Speaker 4: actually break it up into those three dimensional facets. So
- 25:24Speaker 4: the first one is the consumer facing side. So you
- 25:28Speaker 4: know the consumer of today needs everything on their phone
- 25:32Speaker 4: and text messages, etc. I mean like most of the
- 25:34Speaker 4: times they like to talk and if so, then on
- 25:38Speaker 4: a secure line. You know, people want just convenience, right,
- 25:41Speaker 4: So we are trying to bring in that that kind
- 25:45Speaker 4: from model to the patients where they go through an
- 25:49Speaker 4: appless environment where everything is initiated through text. And then
- 25:53Speaker 4: essentially what the pharmacist does is when they call, pharmacists
- 25:56Speaker 4: are looking at the screen and then interpreting the data
- 25:59Speaker 4: that has been relied to them from a farmacy envinagement
- 26:02Speaker 4: system and then talking about that to a patient.
- 26:05Speaker 1: Right.
- 26:05Speaker 4: So some of the stuff we can automate because we
- 26:08Speaker 4: have that, we can actually authenticate the patient in a
- 26:12Speaker 4: secure manner. Once the patient is authenticated, we can talk
- 26:15Speaker 4: to them about their medications, is it ready or not,
- 26:17Speaker 4: if they have a copay and they'd like to pay
- 26:19Speaker 4: for it or that's four hours. All this information is
- 26:23Speaker 4: what typically the pharmacism is on the phone line for right,
- 26:27Speaker 4: So we are trying to bring air into that kind
- 26:31Speaker 4: of mechanism for the phones. And also we are allowing
- 26:34Speaker 4: them to chat with the AI bot that can securely
- 26:39Speaker 4: send that message that like, hey these are these are
- 26:41Speaker 4: your refils? Do you want to authorize? Pay for it?
- 26:44Speaker 4: And all that kind of stuff. So with the phone
- 26:46Speaker 4: and the chat, that's what we're doing. The second one
- 26:48Speaker 4: is the product site where we are putting in AI
- 26:54Speaker 4: into the system. So, for example, a lot of the
- 26:56Speaker 4: electronic prescriptions come through, we see that the the day's
- 27:00Speaker 4: supply is missing, right, and most of the time the
- 27:03Speaker 4: system usually prompts it like, hey they supply missing, please enter.
- 27:06Speaker 4: But you could actually use AI by looking at the directions,
- 27:10Speaker 4: knowing the medication and like automatically populating that kind of data. Right,
- 27:14Speaker 4: So those are the kind of stuff that we can
- 27:16Speaker 4: actually bridge into the pull into the product so that
- 27:21Speaker 4: way the AI can utilize for the pharmacy. And the
- 27:24Speaker 4: third facet is the service side. So pharmacyse callars for
- 27:28Speaker 4: support and service. Most of the times is the same
- 27:32Speaker 4: scenario that is happening in one pharmacy, and the same
- 27:34Speaker 4: solution that is happening in one pharmacy is being applied
- 27:37Speaker 4: to thousands of them. Right, So you are getting on
- 27:38Speaker 4: the same phone call and you are just answering the
- 27:40Speaker 4: same thing. So we are using the knowledge based articles
- 27:44Speaker 4: that we have to generate the AI bought that can
- 27:47Speaker 4: respond to the standard questions that typical pharmacies have. Beyond these,
- 27:53Speaker 4: they if a patient wants to speak with the pharmacist,
- 27:55Speaker 4: we are not stopping that. We are still allowing the
- 27:58Speaker 4: patient to communicate effectively, just trying to utilize the time
- 28:02Speaker 4: for the farms smartly. If they are interpreting the same
- 28:05Speaker 4: data to their mouth, you're simply using AIO the same
- 28:09Speaker 4: thing that we are doing. Support things.
- 28:13Speaker 2: That's exciting being able to some pharmacies talk about having
- 28:19Speaker 2: you know, switching on an iv O or switching IVR providers,
- 28:23Speaker 2: something along those lines, and just noticing how much quieter
- 28:29Speaker 2: and calmer the pharmacy feels without a phone constantly ringing.
- 28:34Speaker 2: I think that makes a big difference if a lot
- 28:37Speaker 2: of the calls can be handled with an AI agent.
- 28:41Speaker 2: You know, refills get processed, prescribers get to leave messages
- 28:46Speaker 2: whatever it looks like, you know, easy, easy questions. Are
- 28:49Speaker 2: you open today? What are your hours handled? Without having
- 28:53Speaker 2: to talk to a live person?
- 28:55Speaker 4: You know, I want my prescription delivered? Versus pective, do
- 28:58Speaker 4: you really need people to be on that call for
- 29:01Speaker 4: those three minutes. And you know what, I think, as
- 29:05Speaker 4: this technology matures and more and more pharmacies atop, I
- 29:09Speaker 4: actually think it will aid in less errors as well,
- 29:13Speaker 4: because what happens is when you're filling up prescription and
- 29:16Speaker 4: then you're distracted by phones, that's what actually breaks your
- 29:19Speaker 4: thought of like thought pattern into a clinical decision. Right,
- 29:23Speaker 4: So if we allow less and less noise into the
- 29:26Speaker 4: pharmacy and let the pharmacies being more hammer I think
- 29:28Speaker 4: they'll make less errors as well, So it will actually
- 29:31Speaker 4: help them.
- 29:32Speaker 2: I think the pharmacists feel like they're having a better
- 29:35Speaker 2: interaction with the patients that are in the store too,
- 29:39Speaker 2: when there's less distraction behind the pharmacy counter. You know,
- 29:43Speaker 2: most of the time, it's really nice to have a
- 29:45Speaker 2: conversation with a patient, even if it's not you know,
- 29:49Speaker 2: once we've taken care of any questions that they have
- 29:51Speaker 2: about medications or first aid or you know, if I'm
- 29:54Speaker 2: doing some sort of triage question that they have about
- 29:58Speaker 2: symptoms that have shown up, but to also you know,
- 30:02Speaker 2: ask about family or other events that are going on
- 30:05Speaker 2: in town. I was, you know, I grew up in
- 30:08Speaker 2: a small business my parents owned a small business and
- 30:11Speaker 2: then worked for my next door neighbor when I was
- 30:14Speaker 2: in high school in his pharmacy, and you know, it
- 30:17Speaker 2: was just it was nice to be able to have
- 30:19Speaker 2: those sorts of conversations when when patients came in there.
- 30:22Speaker 2: I mean, there was one gentleman who had come in
- 30:25Speaker 2: and he he had a different magic trick every time
- 30:29Speaker 2: he came in. So I always got a little magic
- 30:31Speaker 2: trick from Bill.
- 30:34Speaker 1: That's cool. That's the specialness of the relationships that are
- 30:38Speaker 1: built with people in the community, and and then the
- 30:41Speaker 1: networking that happens within the community. To understand, I had
- 30:45Speaker 1: no idea my independent community pharmacy did this, this or this,
- 30:49Speaker 1: and it's it's that continuing banging of the of that
- 30:53Speaker 1: steady drum for being the advocate of their patient and
- 30:58Speaker 1: fighting for their patient. And you just don't get that
- 31:01Speaker 1: with some of the you know, I'm a fan of
- 31:04Speaker 1: the big chain pharmacists out there because I want them
- 31:08Speaker 1: to succeed too, But there's just a flavor difference of
- 31:12Speaker 1: it all. It's almost like, you know, you can eat
- 31:16Speaker 1: Chick fil A, which is my most favorite you know,
- 31:19Speaker 1: fast food, ever it'll always i mean nothing beats it
- 31:23Speaker 1: for me at least, But I'm not eating that every day.
- 31:25Speaker 1: I'm gonna go home and get some nutritional food. And
- 31:30Speaker 1: I just feel like that's it's a difference in pharmacy
- 31:33Speaker 1: of what our independence are able to do because it's customization.
- 31:36Speaker 1: Everybody keeps saying this buzzwords precision medicine, Well what does
- 31:39Speaker 1: that mean? That means personalization. That means, hey, you are
- 31:43Speaker 1: you are patient. You might have a number in my system,
- 31:46Speaker 1: but you're completely different needs than anyone else that's coming
- 31:50Speaker 1: into my opportunity to engage you and talk to you
- 31:53Speaker 1: about better health. And then that trickles down into the
- 31:55Speaker 1: entire families that these people are talking taken care of.
- 31:59Speaker 1: If one family member has diabetes and the rest of
- 32:02Speaker 1: the family is, you know, is accessible, there's lots of
- 32:07Speaker 1: questions that can be asked, Hey, how's everything going with
- 32:09Speaker 1: your children, or how's you know, how's your grandmother doing?
- 32:12Speaker 1: And that inclusiveness is is what healthcare is missing when
- 32:19Speaker 1: it's being pushed into fast bang bang bang bang bang.
- 32:23Speaker 1: Let's do a thousand prescriptions a day and barely make it.
- 32:27Speaker 1: Now we're being drawn back. I don't want to say
- 32:30Speaker 1: the old fashioned days, but drawn back to a time
- 32:33Speaker 1: where things were just a little bit more slowed down,
- 32:36Speaker 1: but it was the quality of the healthcare being provided
- 32:39Speaker 1: versus the quantity.
- 32:41Speaker 2: You mentioned precision medicine, you know. So that that makes
- 32:45Speaker 2: me think of one of the interoperability challenges that we
- 32:48Speaker 2: have right now. I was working earlier today on a project.
- 32:54Speaker 2: NCPA has an elective rotation, So right now we have
- 32:58Speaker 2: pharmacy students are on rotation with NCPA. We do it
- 33:03Speaker 2: virtual and then also in person in DC. But one
- 33:06Speaker 2: of them is very interested in technology and how pharmacy
- 33:11Speaker 2: is practice management can be assisted by technology, and I said, well,
- 33:16Speaker 2: let's look at this list of sixty some and so
- 33:20Speaker 2: there's sixty two approved message codes that exist in the
- 33:24Speaker 2: NCPDP standard to tell the pharmacist in a codified, specific way.
- 33:30Speaker 5: So it's not free text.
- 33:31Speaker 2: It's like a two character code numbers one through sixty two.
- 33:35Speaker 2: Presently something about the approved claim response.
- 33:40Speaker 5: It's come back.
- 33:41Speaker 2: So most recently with Maximum Fair Price the drug Negotiation program,
- 33:47Speaker 2: we all got real attuned to the approved message code
- 33:51Speaker 2: zero six one right that this claim is eligible for
- 33:54Speaker 2: the maximum Fair pricing. There's a different approved message code
- 33:58Speaker 2: that would tell the pharmacy see that refills for particular
- 34:02Speaker 2: medication are going to be dependent on the patient having
- 34:08Speaker 2: a match with their pharmacogenomic panel. So how does the
- 34:15Speaker 2: pharmacy know what the patient's pharmacogenomics are if they've ever
- 34:19Speaker 2: had testing period, or maybe testing needs to be ordered.
- 34:23Speaker 2: So I think that gets at my point of something
- 34:26Speaker 2: that's an interoperability gap that we're experiencing right now. I
- 34:30Speaker 2: don't know that pharmacogenomic results are are well standardized. I
- 34:37Speaker 2: think there exists some standardization for you know, the metabolizer
- 34:42Speaker 2: status on the various sip enzymes or other enzymes that
- 34:45Speaker 2: we're curious about for pharmacogenomics, but that's really important information
- 34:50Speaker 2: and could be really useful to have available, Like if
- 34:54Speaker 2: the testing has been done, how can it be incorporated
- 34:58Speaker 2: into the patient's prescription profile, well, sort of along the
- 35:01Speaker 2: lines of an allergy status or some other intolerance, so
- 35:06Speaker 2: that anytime a new prescription comes in, the pharmacy can
- 35:09Speaker 2: screen for that right away. We know some health plans
- 35:13Speaker 2: like can do that, but that's probably in a case
- 35:15Speaker 2: where they required and then paid for the particular test,
- 35:21Speaker 2: and it could be specific gene, it might be a
- 35:24Speaker 2: panel we don't know.
- 35:28Speaker 4: I think and all those you knows as the standards evolve,
- 35:33Speaker 4: sotus technology, right. You know that EHL seven used to
- 35:37Speaker 4: be the mainstay, and now everything's fired because the expanded
- 35:40Speaker 4: data sets and all that's sometimes I wish you would
- 35:46Speaker 4: go into something and break it and restructure it with
- 35:49Speaker 4: the modern or the current reamborsement and the modern pharmacy inside, right,
- 35:55Speaker 4: and then also centralize that data feeds so that way
- 35:59Speaker 4: all these clinical decis can be made appropriately by the pharmacy,
- 36:03Speaker 4: by the prescriber or any of the caregivers, right, and
- 36:07Speaker 4: patients being center. And there are a lot of organizations
- 36:11Speaker 4: that have started doing this. I think adoption is primarily
- 36:18Speaker 4: an issue. The reason is because the reimbursement cycles have
- 36:21Speaker 4: not necessarily callven through that right. So what happens is
- 36:24Speaker 4: you may have the best intention, but the technology the
- 36:27Speaker 4: ability for you to coach your staff in a particular
- 36:30Speaker 4: manner and then provide that patient the care that they
- 36:34Speaker 4: are supposed to get, right, is where I think the
- 36:37Speaker 4: opportunities are. Like the pharmacutenomics code that you're referring to,
- 36:41Speaker 4: you could have a code, but as you said, in
- 36:43Speaker 4: absence of data, then like what do you do with
- 36:46Speaker 4: that right, Like, you have the ready to communicate, but
- 36:48Speaker 4: then you still have half of the other standards that
- 36:50Speaker 4: are not merging. So you know, there will be a
- 36:54Speaker 4: point in time and when you know, the policy people,
- 36:59Speaker 4: legislators that take vendors and everybody will come and agree
- 37:02Speaker 4: on a communicating standard and all the things that need
- 37:06Speaker 4: to happen in place for the modern polacy. And I
- 37:10Speaker 4: think I'm looking forward to that day when that happened.
- 37:13Speaker 4: But I think if that were to happen, that will
- 37:15Speaker 4: be a perfect kind of match and help.
- 37:20Speaker 1: Lisa. You have an opportunity to connect with so many
- 37:24Speaker 1: different pharmacies at different stages of their evolution and being
- 37:30Speaker 1: more profitable and setting up maybe to buy other pharmacies
- 37:34Speaker 1: or expanding their long term care pharmacy at home. Is
- 37:38Speaker 1: there anything that's a that's very bright to you right now?
- 37:42Speaker 1: Very you know, you're like, wow, this is a space
- 37:46Speaker 1: that more and more of our independent community pharmacies they
- 37:50Speaker 1: have to adopt this, uh, this service or this one thing,
- 37:54Speaker 1: just to give them a direction as to what they
- 37:57Speaker 1: should spend be spending more time on of what the
- 38:01Speaker 1: next evolution of their business looks like.
- 38:04Speaker 2: Yeah, the first thing that comes to mind is long
- 38:09Speaker 2: term care, long term care at home. I think a
- 38:14Speaker 2: lot of it just sort of the way that long
- 38:17Speaker 2: term care facilities are operated, staffed, funded.
- 38:24Speaker 5: You know, there were there's some were probably not fully
- 38:29Speaker 5: on the.
- 38:29Speaker 2: Other side of whatever the disruption event that the pandemic
- 38:35Speaker 2: was for those sorts of entities, but you know, the workforce,
- 38:42Speaker 2: the long term healthcare workforce suffered a bit. But I
- 38:47Speaker 2: think long term care in particular, so I think we
- 38:51Speaker 2: are seeing a lot of folks that are much more
- 38:53Speaker 2: interested in aging at home and how you know, between
- 38:59Speaker 2: any any private long term care insurance or medicare or
- 39:04Speaker 2: even self pay, how that how that comes together financially.
- 39:10Speaker 2: But then also there still needs to be a workforce
- 39:13Speaker 2: for somebody to have long term care at home. So
- 39:17Speaker 2: I think that pharmacy potentially adds the ability to really
- 39:22Speaker 2: support high quality long term care at home services, you know,
- 39:28Speaker 2: being able to provide consistent, high quality of medication services,
- 39:32Speaker 2: you know, sort of the never out situation, the quick
- 39:35Speaker 2: response when meds change is super important.
- 39:40Speaker 5: That's the I guess that's what comes to mind first.
- 39:43Speaker 2: You know, I think another thing that even has crossed
- 39:47Speaker 2: the administrations and remains a high interest from HHS is
- 39:54Speaker 2: identifying and trying to help folks have like a void
- 40:00Speaker 2: to diabetes diagnosis, but once a diabetes diagnosis exists, manage
- 40:05Speaker 2: blood sugar and avoid consequences of poorly controlled diabetes. So
- 40:10Speaker 2: I think that's another you know, we have been helping
- 40:13Speaker 2: pharmacies stand up programs that they're pharmacy that meet the
- 40:17Speaker 2: National Diabetes Prevention Program criteria. You know, that's a that's
- 40:22Speaker 2: a formal program that CMS recognizes and would open up
- 40:26Speaker 2: to pharmacies additional UH revenue revenue sources for having a
- 40:32Speaker 2: recognized program and offering those services. So you know, I
- 40:35Speaker 2: think diabetes prevention, diabetes self management is the one that
- 40:42Speaker 2: is going to stand the test of time, that will
- 40:44Speaker 2: always be an opportunity for pharmacies.
- 40:46Speaker 1: I think agreed. I just want to shout out and say,
- 40:51Speaker 1: you know, thank you Lisa for for being a part
- 40:55Speaker 1: of this change and this sustainable change, this this change
- 41:00Speaker 1: growth where it's it's it's not just a change in
- 41:03Speaker 1: the same model that you and I entered when we
- 41:07Speaker 1: entered pharmacy originally, it's really new. If you were if
- 41:11Speaker 1: you're graduating pharmacy school in twenty twenty five, twenty twenty six,
- 41:16Speaker 1: twenty twenty seven. Your pharmacist's career is you know, drastically
- 41:22Speaker 1: different than what a pharmacist that graduated twenty thirty years ago.
- 41:27Speaker 1: And the evolution of how the government, how payment systems,
- 41:33Speaker 1: how private insurance, how HHS looks at community pharmacy will
- 41:38Speaker 1: never be the same. Since the pandemic shows that you know,
- 41:42Speaker 1: ninety three percent of all of your immunizations, of your
- 41:46Speaker 1: flu shots, ninety three fricking percent, my goodness, is coming
- 41:51Speaker 1: through our community pharmacies. Like that is like, if you're
- 41:53Speaker 1: keeping the nation safe, if you're keeping the nation healthy,
- 41:59Speaker 1: it's coming from your community pharmacy. And that of all
- 42:03Speaker 1: of the stats, that's one I was most proud of
- 42:06Speaker 1: to see within the latest digest.
- 42:09Speaker 2: Yeah, one thing they'll be really exciting you talk about
- 42:12Speaker 2: folks that are graduating now and what practice can look
- 42:15Speaker 2: like for them in the in the coming years. You know,
- 42:17Speaker 2: there are you know, task groups that NCPDP that are
- 42:22Speaker 2: looking at what does the standardized medication profile look like?
- 42:27Speaker 2: You know, there's there's a fire resource for that, but
- 42:31Speaker 2: what does adoption? You know, what does a healthcare environment
- 42:36Speaker 2: look like when pharmacies patients, primary care, the patient themselves,
- 42:41Speaker 2: and any specialists all have access to the same medication
- 42:45Speaker 2: profile for the patient. What's active, what allergies do they have,
- 42:49Speaker 2: what have they taken in the past, what was the
- 42:51Speaker 2: reason something was discontinued? Super exciting. I mentioned the diabetes
- 42:55Speaker 2: prevention program. There's also exists a transaction for between any
- 43:02Speaker 2: healthcare providers to make a referral. There's no reason that
- 43:05Speaker 2: a primary care can't make a referral to a pharmacy
- 43:09Speaker 2: that has a diabetes prevention program. You know, say a patient,
- 43:13Speaker 2: I need you to go and get enrolled in this
- 43:16Speaker 2: patient's pharmacy. Pharmacy can accept the referral, they can report back,
- 43:21Speaker 2: they could use a care plan to do that.
- 43:23Speaker 5: Potentially.
- 43:24Speaker 2: There's also a standard for a pharmacy consultation. Note it's
- 43:28Speaker 2: used in long term care much more than in community
- 43:32Speaker 2: regular pharmacy, But those all exist and could be really
- 43:36Speaker 2: exciting ways of making sure everybody has the same information
- 43:41Speaker 2: about the patient that we're all caring for.
- 43:47Speaker 1: Absolutely, Kaiden, what do you want to shout out to
- 43:51Speaker 1: the listeners right now with regards to plans for twenty
- 43:55Speaker 1: twenty six Things that you've seen become successful programs for
- 44:01Speaker 1: our independent community pharmacies in twenty twenty five, what have
- 44:04Speaker 1: you seen standing out and shining in the clients that
- 44:10Speaker 1: you serve and help?
- 44:12Speaker 4: So, I mean, I think the pharmacists know this business
- 44:17Speaker 4: better than anyone else. The main challenge for them has
- 44:21Speaker 4: been just time and the effort to have this mind
- 44:24Speaker 4: shift right. I mean, all the opportunities are that they,
- 44:27Speaker 4: you know, like us, a lot of other organizations have
- 44:29Speaker 4: been speaking about the care plans and the medical building
- 44:32Speaker 4: and the nursing home at sorry LTC at home options.
- 44:38Speaker 4: So they are aware, but they are just plagued with
- 44:41Speaker 4: the amount of work that they are doing. And I
- 44:43Speaker 4: think if they start investing more into the automation and
- 44:48Speaker 4: the AI pieces of it to free up their time,
- 44:51Speaker 4: right so that way they can then take advantage of
- 44:54Speaker 4: those kind of opportunities, that would be helpful. I think
- 45:00Speaker 4: three and MFP has tons of changes that are coming
- 45:04Speaker 4: down the road. I know the standards are changing in
- 45:07Speaker 4: twenty twenty January for e prescribing and subsequently for the
- 45:12Speaker 4: DZER transmissions as well the telecom communication standards, so that's
- 45:17Speaker 4: changing and those things are going to actually impact Those
- 45:24Speaker 4: things are going to impact the farmcis a lot more
- 45:27Speaker 4: down the road, right, So we as tegmndors are trying
- 45:29Speaker 4: to do everything that we need to do to bring
- 45:32Speaker 4: these changes in the most seamless manner as possible. As
- 45:36Speaker 4: long as they are invested into making sure that these works,
- 45:40Speaker 4: it will help.
- 45:40Speaker 1: The mighty Well. I tell you what, it's exciting time.
- 45:45Speaker 1: It's time to plug in. It's time to learn from
- 45:48Speaker 1: other organizations as well as our independent community pharmacy owners
- 45:53Speaker 1: and operators that are doing things differently. They flip their
- 45:57Speaker 1: pharmacies years ago and now they're ready to bring on
- 46:02Speaker 1: the new services that are going to be provided by independence.
- 46:07Speaker 1: But a shout out to you also to our technicians.
- 46:10Speaker 1: The role of the technician is going to change, just
- 46:13Speaker 1: like the role of our pharmacists are going to change
- 46:15Speaker 1: and become enhanced with with a dig down into treatment
- 46:19Speaker 1: and a dig down into holding the hand of the
- 46:22Speaker 1: patient a little closer, and also backfilling so many of
- 46:27Speaker 1: the sections of our nation that now have healthcare deserts,
- 46:34Speaker 1: health care service deserts, and pharmacy deserts. There's an opportunity
- 46:38Speaker 1: for our well positioned independent community pharmacies to backfill and
- 46:43Speaker 1: to grow. So you know we've been through a lot
- 46:47Speaker 1: over the last three years with d R fees and
- 46:51Speaker 1: things that are that are happening in our in our markets.
- 46:53Speaker 1: But I think we're through the worst of it all,
- 46:56Speaker 1: and I think what's coming now is going to be
- 46:59Speaker 1: a rebuilding of what is our independent community pharmacy's purpose
- 47:03Speaker 1: and how have we communicated that purpose out to the communities,
- 47:07Speaker 1: out to our people, into our nations and our news
- 47:09Speaker 1: organizations to finally tell the public what pharmacists are capable
- 47:14Speaker 1: of doing. This is awesome. But thank you Kaden for
- 47:17Speaker 1: being part of this. And Lisa, this is so good
- 47:20Speaker 1: to see you. I hope we have you back sooner
- 47:23Speaker 1: than later. For sure.
- 47:25Speaker 5: Paul's like a plan.
- 47:28Speaker 4: Louis fun to be here.
- 47:29Speaker 1: Don Thank you so much for listening to Pharmacy Podcast
- 47:34Speaker 1: Tech Trends sponsored by primar X. For more information on
- 47:38Speaker 1: primar X, please take a look at primearx dot io
- 47:42Speaker 1: and there's a podcast tab there too. To listen to
- 47:45Speaker 1: other shows. Reach out to your NCPA contact. If you
- 47:50Speaker 1: are not a member, please look at the news services
- 47:53Speaker 1: being offered through the NCPA, starting with the powerful data
- 47:57Speaker 1: coming from the NCPA. Do I just and get ready
- 48:01Speaker 1: for the super Bowl of Independent Community Pharmacy and get
- 48:05Speaker 1: togethers and in conferences in October in Kansas City. I
- 48:10Speaker 1: think it's in Kansas City this year, is.
- 48:11Speaker 5: That right, that's correct.
- 48:13Speaker 1: Yeah, I can't wait. All right, Thank you both for
- 48:16Speaker 1: being here.