McKesson Pharmacy of the Year winners put patient care, community first

If anyone needed evidence that the independent pharmacy is more to its patients than simply a place to get prescriptions filled, they need look no further than the McKesson Pharmacy of the Year Grand Prize winner and the three regional winners recognized by McKesson at ideaShare 2016. All of the winners share a special commitment to being an indispensible resource and healthcare destination for the communities they serve, and have a common goal to improve patient care.



Pharmacist-owner Josh Borer of Rex Pharmacy in Atlantic, IA was named the 2016 Pharmacy of the Year Grand Prize award recipient. According to Borer, one of the main motivators for him and his staff is the simple desire to better serve the people of his community and help improve their health.



“In our pharmacy we have a ‘why?’ statement, and the crux of it is patient outcomes,” Borer told Drug Store News. “So we sat down and asked ‘Why are we doing this? Why is it important to us? Why is it important to our patients?’ And patient outcomes was the main focus that everyone bought into — that we could actually make a difference with our customers in our community with health outcomes.”



Rex Pharmacy currently has more than 415 patients enrolled in a relatively new medication synchronization program, which has freed up Borer and his staff to add other services that also are helping to drive improved outcomes for its patients. According to Borer, one of the most critical factors for the success of his med sync program has been his staff, which he encouraged to help identify potential patients for the program, so they would have buy-in to the pharmacy’s efforts.



Borer’s highly tenured staff — one of his pharmacists has 25 years with the company — has been a key asset that he inherited when he acquired the 75-year-old pharmacy operation a few years ago.



One of the most recent additions to Rex Pharmacy’s expanding roster of clinical services has been the introduction of a pharmacogenetic testing program, which tests for more than 200 prescription and OTC medications. The store also offers personalized medication reviews, medication therapy management, diabetic shoe fittings and has been working with local providers on transitions of care.



Rex Pharmacy’s collaborative efforts with providers, according to Borer, arose organically from his involvement in the community, particularly his work in quality improvement committees at the local hospital. He views the pharmacy’s offerings as filling white spaces that otherwise go overlooked in patient care.



“I think there are probably a lot of problems out there we could help solve, and being involved helps us identify where there is a need and where there is a place we can fill a gap,” he said.



Hampstead, Md.-based North East regional winner Family Health Mart’s owner Eric Yospa also is driven by a desire to fill gaps in the community’s care — in this case for a community he has been part of his whole life. Opened in 1975, the pharmacy has seen its patient base change from primarily a rural farming community to a larger mix of professionals moving further out from the city as the suburban areas closer to Baltimore have become more crowded and pricey. Yospa said Family Health Mart, with a healthy compounding business, has become a destination for patients seeking hard-to-find medications and dosage forms — and veterinary medications — alongside other clinical services like medication therapy management, which Yospa recently began handling himself.



“Just recently I started doing MTM, and found I really enjoy doing it,” he said. “It takes time but, … because I know [my patients] so well, it's an easy conversation and they're honest about their health, which makes a big difference.”



Like Family Health Mart, Pleasant View, Utah’s, Mountain View pharmacy, West regional winner, offers compounding services, and owner Hal Roe has been as involved in his pharmacies’ communities — he operates a total of five pharmacies in the area — as he has in the independent pharmacy community, participating as a speaker in two recent Health Mart Town Hall meetings about Star Ratings and med sync.



As for South regional award winner Iuka Discount Drugs in Iuka, Miss., owner Chris Cornielson attributes his pharmacy’s many strengths to his staff and the investment he makes in them. Iuka’s unique array of services range from special in-store classes to help seniors choose a Medicare plan to diabetes management and diabetic shoe fittings, immunizations, MTM and other clinical services. In addition the store also found early success in a supplements business called Solutions Rx, Cornielson explained.



“We come into work every morning, and we have a morning huddle and talk about being great and being a world-class team,” Cornielson told Drug Store News. “That's what we strive for. We want to change people's lives in our community, and I really want our customers to know that I've got a great team.”