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On the heels of several high-profile acquisitions, Walgreens aims to be a point of entry for consumers for healthcare services ranging from urgent care to specialty care and even in-home health...Walgreen's VillageMD unit recently announced it was buying another urgent and primary care chain, Summit Health-CityMD, in a deal worth close to $9 billion. The VillageMD-Summit Health deal will expand Walgreen's reach into primary, specialty and urgent care. Combined, VillageMD and Summit Health will operate more than 680 provider locations in 26 markets...READ MORE

In an interview with Drug Topics®, Ken Perez, MBA, vice president of Healthcare Policy and Government Affairs at Omnicell, explained the crucial points of Medicare Part B provider status for pharmacists, which would allow pharmacists in underserved communities to be reimbursed for certain primary care services that they already provide in commercially ensured populations...READ MORE

Eli Lilly is asking a federal court to stop the federal government from imposing any penalties over its decision to restrict sales of 340B-discounted products to contract pharmacies...The request for a preliminary injunction and temporary restraining order...comes less than a week after the Health Resources and Services Administration wrote to Lilly and five other drug companies over the contract pharmacy restrictions...The injunction and order show that drug companies appear likely to fight HRSA’s order to immediately offer 340B-discounted drugs to contract pharmacies, which are third-party entities that dispense drugs on behalf of the 340B covered entities...READ MORE

Preventing medication errors is an essential component of caring for patients and must be a core mission of every pharmacy. For medication error–prevention efforts to be effective, they must be a priority...The information in the tables of this review summarizes many of the significant error-prevention strategies recommended in the ISMP Medication Safety Alert! Acute Care newsletter from January through December 2020...READ MORE

Table 1. Safety Issues Related to Labeling, Packaging, and Nomenclature
Auxiliary label obscures critical reconstitution information on label of REVATIO (sildenafil; Pfizer) oral suspension carton

Table 2. Safety Issues Associated With Order Communication and Documentation
Confusion between LYUMJEV and HUMALOG (both insulin lispro by Lilly), which have different onsets of action

Table 3. Problems Involving Drug Information, Patient Information, Patient Education, and Staff Education
Administer adenosine rapidly for cardioversion

Table 4. Safety Issues Related to Medical Devices and Equipment
Bypassing soft low-dose alerts for subtherapeutic heparin infusions

Table 5. Other Discussion Items
Differences between human error, at-risk behavior, and reckless behavior

Table 6. ISMP’s Targeted Medication Safety Best Practices for Hospitals
FDA removes syringe administration from vinCRIStine labeling

Amazon has rolled out a new virtual medical clinic that aims to treat common conditions like allergies, hair loss and skin conditions...The message-based virtual health service connects consumers with licensed clinicians who can diagnose, treat and prescribe medication for a range of common health and lifestyle conditions...Amazon Clinic partners with third-party telehealth providers including SteadyMD and HealthTap, powered by Wheel, to provide virtual consultation services. Consumers will see upfront pricing for care and an estimated response time. The service creates synergies with Amazon Pharmacy to fill and deliver any medications Amazon Clinic users are prescribed...Amazon Clinic will be cash pay and does not yet accept insurance...READ MORE

Nevada will become one of the first states to allow pharmacists to prescribe human immunodeficiency virus prevention drugs to patients at risk of contracting the virus, as the state works to combat one of the highest rates of HIV diagnoses in the country...A bill signed by Gov. Steve Sisolak on June 6 authorizes pharmacists with sufficient liability coverage to prescribe, dispense and administer HIV prevention drugs — including post-exposure prophylaxis to people who may have come into contact with HIV and pre-exposure prophylaxis for people at risk — without a prescription from a practitioner starting as early as Oct. 1, in accordance with protocols to be developed by the State Board of Pharmacy over the next several months...READ MORE

Lawmakers behind the Improving Seniors’ Timely Access to Care Act...not only requires electronic prior authorization for MA plans, but also requires the Department of Health and Human Services to create a process for faster decisions on items and services that commonly get approved...While the bill only applies to MA plans, lawmakers hope to eventually tackle more types of insurance such as commercial plans...READ MORE

Results from a new HDA Research Foundation survey indicate that the pharmaceutical supply chain is entering a critical phase in achieving the transaction data connections required to comply with the Drug Supply Chain Security Act in 2023...The DSCSA requires transaction data with product identifiers to be provided with physical product on November 27, 2023...“many healthcare supply chain trading partners are realizing there is work to be done to establish proper business-to-business connections; ensure data are formatted, transmitted and received successfully; that processes for troubleshooting are created; and that products in inventory have the right data attached to them for shipping after November 27,” said Perry Fri...COO of the HDA Research Foundation. “The Foundation’s survey shows...what might be leading to slow implementation rates across the supply chain.”...READ MORE

In reality, nearly half (44%) of hospital pharmacists experienced a diversion event within the past 12 months, which is up from 37% in 2019. The COVID-19 pandemic has exacerbated this “hidden epidemic,” a multi-faceted challenge which poses serious risks to patients, clinicians and healthcare systems...Here are 5 questions frequently asked by health systems seeking to accelerate and improve their efforts to detect and mitigate drug diversion incidents...READ MORE

1. What are the biggest challenges in identifying drug diversion?
2. How have responsibilities for addressing and resolving drug diversion issues evolved?
3. What offers the biggest opportunity to improve diversion identification?
4. When selecting automated systems and software, which capabilities are most critical?
5. How do you justify the cost of technology in a difficult economic environment?

A December 2020 opinion issued by Washington Attorney General...affirmed pharmacists’ standard of practice under collaborative drug therapy agreements (CDTAs)...“[The opinion] clearly states that pharmacists working under CDTAs can identify and treat illness. This is reassuring news to practitioners who have developed practices that care for patients with these agreements,”...The opinion was a response to questions from the Washington State Medical Commission about whether pharmacists can diagnose patients pursuant to CDTAs—and if that constitutes unauthorized practice of medicine—and whether prescribers can enter CDTAs permitting pharmacists to diagnose patients...READ MORE