Ever gone through the drive-thru at a fast food restaurant and got home to find that your order wasn’t right? I’m sure most everyone has experienced this. I’m not singling out fast food restaurants but trying to make a point about rapid, volume driven service models.
Pharmacy is becoming just that. High volume, rapid prescription fills that are touting the convenience of prescriptions being delivered by the post office or another service. Our medications are quickly becoming nothing more than a commodity. Way too often the drugs we get are what is actually best for the insurance company and PBM (Pharmacy Benefits Manager) and are no longer the best medication that our medical provider has decided is right for us. Medication decisions are largely chosen by the profit generated for the insurance company and this dictates what medication is often times covered by your plan. At Dakota Pharmacy we find this behavior detrimental to the health and wellness of our patients and take these changes very seriously. Stay tuned for future blogs discussing more about this and what is happening in pharmacies across this country.
So, what will your pharmacy look like in five years? Will it be owned and operated by a pharmacist delivering the best care for every individual patient? Or will it be a large corporate pharmacy whose biggest concern is their bottom line? Will your pharmacy be owned by the PBM that tells you that you can only get your medication from the mail order pharmacy that the PBM owns? Or even worst-case scenario will your medication be delivered by a faceless drone that was prepared by a robot in a dank warehouse?
This makes us think about that burger we took home that had onions on it when you specifically asked for no onions! Didn’t taste like we wanted but we choked it down. What happens when the medication we get is not correct? We choke it down and……………
The medication prescribed to us are often lifesaving drugs and when taken improperly can be life ending. Is that what you want your Pharmacy to look like?