Walgreens, Vanderbilt Med Center to provide home healthcare services
DEERFIELD, Ill. Adding to its rapidly expanding healthcare service portfolio, Walgreens has forged a joint venture through its OptionCare home care services with Vanderbilt Medical Center, a Nashville, Tenn.-based comprehensive healthcare facility and a major patient referral center for the mid-South. The jointly run project will operate under the name Vanderbilt Home Care, affiliated with Walgreens Infusion and Respiratory Services, and will be located in Brentwood, Tenn.
The center will offer home infusion and respiratory services, giving patients a cost-effective, at-home alternative to receiving intravenous drug therapy in the hospital. Clinicians at the center will provide home infusion for anti-infectives, inotropics, parenteral nutrition, pain management and other therapies.
Paul Mastrapa, president of Walgreens-OptionCare, praised the joint venture. “The opportunity to join with a leading regional medical center…provides us with the opportunity to strengthen the services we offer our patients,” he said. “Vanderbilt’s commitment to clinical excellence and to delivering positive patient experiences mirrors our own. Together we will continue to focus on providing care and service in the best way possible for our patients.”
Laura Beth Brown, president of Vanderbilt Home Health Care Services, was also upbeat about the new partnership. “A joint venture with a company like Walgreens allows us to enhance the way we meet our mission by providing home infusion, respiratory services and durable medical equipment for all patients in the community,” she said. “The value of this partnership allows patients to receive care in their homes and promotes independence and wellness in the community.”
This is the fourth such joint venture Walgreens has established; similar agreements have been struck with health organizations in Idaho, Ohio and Oregon to provide home infusion and respiratory therapies.
Mastrapa said the venture with Vanderbilt would expand. “While the initial service provided by our joint venture is home infusion therapy, plans call for the addition of home respiratory services later this year,” he noted.
Walgreens’ commitment to a broader health care mission continues to grow. The company now delivers home infusion, respiratory/oxygen and medical equipment services through more than 100 accredited home care facilities in 36 states, along with clinical programs that aim for a coordinated approach to care between patients, physicians and insurance plans.