Pharmacy deserts, or areas where residents lack convenient access to brick-and-mortar pharmacies, are spreading across the United States. They can create barriers to obtaining essential medications and reduce access to other vital services such as vaccinations, medication counseling and health screenings.
In a recent episode of the ShiftShapers podcast, LucyRx CEO David Blair and host David Saltzman delved into this growing crisis in American healthcare and a bold initiative to support patient access to independent and specialty pharmacies: LucyRx’s Sustaining Pharmacy Access & Rural Care (SPARC) Program. In addition to boosting reimbursements to pharmacies and promoting pharmacies as hubs for community-based healthcare services, the program pushes for legislative reforms that expand pharmacists’ scope of practice.
“A pharmacist can’t completely replace a physician, but it can make a big dent,” Blair said during the ShiftShapers interview. “So, when you think about this tidal wave that we have coming with this aging population and the physician shortage, the answer is right in front of us. We have 200,000 pharmacists that are around this country that have been trained for six to eight years in a clinical environment, and we’re not fully utilizing them. We’ve got to change their scope of services so that we can not only address the problem but keep those pharmacies in business.”
LucyRx believes pharmacists are vitally important members of the healthcare system, understands patients don’t have time to wait for mail-order medications, and knows health outcomes improve with ready access to pharmacists.
LucyRx CEO David Blair on Disrupting the PBM Model
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