- Could Preemptive Pharmacogenomic Testing Emerge as an MTM Best Practice? (pharmacytimes.com)
Modern technology is now making genomic testing possible for a fraction of the time and cost..Now pharmacists and physicians can use pharmacogenomic test results to help choose safer and more effective medications for their patients...Pharmacists are undoubtedly the pharmacokinetic experts and the most educated health care providers in regard to the cytochrome P450 system. Preemptive genotyping would make a nice addition to a pharmacy’s list of service offerings and point-of-care testing panel...A clinical consultant pharmacist could use pharmacogenomic testing to guide therapy decisions and decrease drug–drug interactions. This has the potential to save countless health care dollars lost to ineffective medication use, adverse drug events, and hospital readmissions...There are also financial benefits for the testing pharmacy. Looking at pharmacogenomic testing from a medication therapy management perspective, one can imagine the usefulness of integrating genomic testing into a patient’s comprehensive medication review...to make specific evidence-based recommendations to improve patient care.
- Proven cost savings in elderly patients
- Help in predicting and preventing adverse drug reactions
- Decreased hospitalizations due to treatment failure
- Prevention of “trial-and-error” prescribing
Pharmacists are the experts on medication safety and effectiveness, and should be ready to take on the role of personalized medication consultants...Innovation is essential if pharmacy wants to act on new clinical service opportunities and earn a seat at tomorrow’s health care table. We need to be proactive in seeking out new niches...
- McKesson introduces clinical programs platform (chaindrugreview.com)
McKesson Pharmacy Systems & Automation has released the McKesson Clinical Programs Solution, a new platform that enables pharmacists to build customized wellness programs...the Clinical Programs Solution also allows pharmacists to maintain vendor programs for patients with specific medical conditions and saves time and labor costs by automatically synchronizing the data of patients enrolled in a clinical program with McKesson’s EnterpriseRx pharmacy management system...The Clinical Programs Solution offers a wide range of program management capabilities, including a patient-centric view of a patient’s programs and information, real-time notification if a patient is eligible for a clinical program when a prescription is being filled with EnterpriseRx, and a central platform for pharmacies with multiple locations to manage all of their clinical programs.
- Walmart bottled water convoy heading to Flint (drugstorenews.com)
Walmart and three of the nation’s largest bottled water suppliers are coming to the aid of Flint, Michigan, residents who lack access to safe drinking water after the municipal water supply became tainted with lead...Walmart, Coca-Cola, Nestlé and PepsiCo are sending 176 truckloads of water to Flint – roughly 6.5 million bottles – which is an amount estimated to meet the daily needs of more than 10,000 children for the rest of the year..."At Walmart, we take pride in using our strengths to help communities like Flint during times of crisis, as we’ve done around the world in times of need,"..."We’re working to ensure that the children of Flint, the city’s most vulnerable citizens, have access to safe water."...Walmart has already donated 14 trucks of water, or 504,000 bottles, and 1,792 water filters to the Flint community since July 2015...In addition to the water donation, the companies are encouraging others to support the Flint community by working with Good360 where nonprofits operating in Flint are listing their needs online.
- Walmart to close more than 250 stores globally (drugstorenews.com)Here’s a list and map of all the Walmart store closings in the US (qz.com)
Walmart said it will close 269 stores worldwide this year, including many of its smallest stores, in an unprecedented move CEO Doug McMillon characterized as being more disciplined about growth...Plans call for the company to close 154 locations in the U.S., including the company’s 102 smallest format stores, Walmart Express, which had been in pilot since 2011. Walmart said it will focus on strengthening its large format supercenters, optimizing Neighborhood Markets which average about 40,000-sq.-ft., growing the e-commerce business and expanding pickup services for customers. In terms of closures by format type, the company said the 154 U.S. locations consist of 23 Neighborhood Markets, 12 supercenters, seven stores in Puerto Rico, six discount centers and four Sam’s Clubs...Walmart did not disclose how many of stores slated for closure contain a pharmacy. However the figure is expected to be less than the total because many of the affected stores are small formats that did not contain pharmacies...(Nevada - Supercenter at 4350 N Nellis Blvd. in Las Vegas closed, today 1/17/16)
- Boots changes prices after accusations of sexism (cnbc.com)
U.K. drug store Boots has bowed to pressure and cut the prices on some of its products after it emerged it was charging women more than men for similar products...An online petition started two weeks ago raised awareness of the price discrepancy between some of Boots' products. An eye cream for men cost £7.29 ($10.56) but the same product advertised to women cost £9.99 ($14.47). Meanwhile, a pack of 10 disposable razors for men cost £1.49, but a pack of eight razors for women costs £2.29...Boots said it conducted a review after the issue was brought to light and has taken action to correct the prices of its own-brand products. It also said it would speak to its suppliers and ask them to conduct a similar review of their brands..."At Boots UK, we have never operated a pricing system that discriminates against women so we were surprised and disappointed to see recent examples in the press that did not reflect our own standards,"...
- CVS site on Las Vegas Strip available at steep price (vegasinc.com)Drugstores galore: Another CVS being built on the Las Vegas Strip (vegasinc.com)
In the latest effort to make millions from the Strip’s lucrative drugstore sector, a CVS has hit the market with a big price tag...Capital Square Realty Advisors is trying to sell its CVS-occupied retail property at the base of Sky Las Vegas, a north Strip condo tower, for $42 million...That’s a 26 percent markup from the investment firm’s nearly $33.3 million purchase in spring 2014, county records show...It’s yet another move to cash in on a growing slice of commerce in the famed casino corridor. Drugstore chains Walgreens and CVS have been opening more stores on tourist-packed Las Vegas Boulevard, as they make big money there selling medicine, food, booze and Vegas-themed souvenirs, including flasks and shot glasses...CVS, for instance, plans to open a store in front of Bally’s — now under construction — in May, and it opened an outpost last year in the new three-story mall at Treasure Island...Investors also sold a Walgreens property on the north Strip in October for $37 million, or $2,310 per square foot. That was up 33 percent from what they paid in 2012.
- Wal-Mart Supercenter closure in Las Vegas hits customers hard (reviewjournal.com)
Wal-Mart Supercenter customers expressed shock, frustration and dismay Sunday night in the final hours before closure of the Nellis Boulevard store, one of the few grocery shopping venues for Nellis Air Force Base families and others who live nearby...Shock that the store was closing so suddenly — just two days after...Wal-Mart Stores Inc., announced that the store at 4350 N. Nellis Blvd. was one of the 269 stores slated for closure globally and the only one in the Las Vegas Valley...Frustration that they now would have to travel farther to buy groceries, fill prescriptions and pick up other goods.
- Connecting the CPOE dots: Where do we go from here? (pharmacist.com)
Over the past several years, there has been a monumental push for hospitals to transition to electronic health records and computerized physician order entry, with the hope of standardizing and streamlining care, improving medication safety, and reducing errors. In fact, some studies estimate that more than 70% of prescriptions are now written electronically. Although CPOE has come a long way in a short period of time, is the technology living up to its potential?...CPOE systems are very fragmented both within hospital systems and between the hospital and the outpatient universe...CPOE in terms of safer medication prescribing is still a work in progress...We found several areas where CPOE systems fall short in terms of medication safety, and hospital pharmacists can play an important role in resolving some of these issues...
- CPOE and medication prescribing
- Interoperability
- CPOE aggravation
- The next frontier
- Room for improvement
- Hospital pharmacists’ role
When you have systems between inpatient and outpatient that don’t communicate, important information can get lost in translation…CPOE isn’t just a hospital pharmacy issue; it’s an issue for the profession at large...Pharmacy has a significant stake in the matter of CPOE, but we really are learning as we go along...that is why you see so much frustration between prescribers and the hospital systems. To solve the problem, multiple professions beyond just health care professionals, with different thought processes, will need to work together...
- Walgreens Boots Alliance outlines 3 growth initiatives at shareholders meeting (drugstorenews.com)
Walgreens Boots Alliance this year moved its annual shareholder's meeting...to...Manhattan, approving three proposals made by the board, reviewing the company's recent events and looking ahead to the future...all of which executives said would help deliver a banner year for Walgreens in 2016.
- Rite Aid acquisition - The addition of rite aid to our network offers the potential for significant cost savings and purchasing efficiencies in addition to opportunities in terms of important market penetration...
- Valeant Pharmaceuticals partnership - ...offer its branded dermatology and ophthalmology products at a reduced cost to the consumer...This partnership...is a demonstration of how partnerships can create value while reducing costs for the system as a whole...
- Boots’ beauty proposition - transforming Walgreens into must-visit destination centers for WBA's owned beauty brands...as part of the company's initiative "Beauty 2000"...
- PSNC refuses to negotiate until government shares plans for community pharmacy (pharmaceutical-journal.com)PSNC demands clarity on NHS England’s long-term plans (psnc.org.uk)
Community pharmacy negotiators are refusing to negotiate with the government over its planned 6% cut in community pharmacy funding in England until it has seen details of the government’s long-term plans and the evidence behind them...The move comes as the Pharmaceutical Services Negotiating Committee voiced its fears that the government is deliberately keeping it in the dark about deeper cuts to come...We cannot agree to commence negotiations before we have had an opportunity to understand fully your plans and the analysis underpinning them…We believe we are entitled to this material but it has not been forthcoming. The government appears to have a settled intention to proceed on a course of action that will run counter to its stated ambition to develop a clinically focused pharmacy service, and be damaging to patient care...the 6% cut will force pharmacies to cut staff and damage patient confidence in the profession; the PSNC is also suspicious of government plans to create more online pharmacy services.