NCPA outlines legislative priorities

ALEXANDRIA, Va. — The National Community Pharmacists Association on Wednesday announced its federal and state legislative priorities with the release of the Independent Community Pharmacy Checklist. The one-page document details the main legislative actions NCPA and its members will advocate for this year at the federal and state levels. 

“The healthcare landscape is changing rapidly as efforts to improve patient outcomes and reduce costs gain momentum,” stated Douglas Hoey, NCPA CEO. "Although there are many issues affecting the ability of patients to access their medications and have a choice in their pharmacist, we believe these legislative priorities have the greatest potential to benefit patients and the pharmacists who serve them," he said. “The largest impediment to independent community pharmacies serving the needs of their patients is the bureaucratic morass they must wade through and the questionable business practices of often unregulated pharmacy benefit managers, which are why greater oversight of this industry is badly needed."

NCPA supports legislative efforts to provide greater choice of pharmacies for consumers, basic transparency in generic prescription drug reimbursement calculations and fairer standards for pharmacy audits at the federal level.

NCPA also supports expanding the pharmacist’s role in health care through coordinated care models, as a first step toward gaining provider status. And NCPA supports preserving patient access to diabetes testing supplies by removing the provision in the fiscal cliff deal to impose draconian reimbursement cuts to these vital products.

Other legislative issues supported by NCPA include protecting patient access to traditional compounding and preserving military family access to community pharmacies by increasing generic prescription drug utilization, while preserving patient choice of pharmacies.