Reasons for Pharmacy Automation
Reasons for Pharmacy Automation
Reasons for Pharmacy AutomationThe corner drug store is going through a fight for survival now. Traditionally that drug store was in our neighborhood and gave us first class service and supplies for everything from bandages to ice cream. We knew the druggist personally and he would always ask how we were and how our families were doing. The competition for these well respected businesses has been growing with the growth of national drug corporations. In truth many of these high service, small businesses have gone out of business or have sold out to the large chain stores. The drug stores of today need to remember some of the characteristics of the corner drug store. The large drug companies have stores in almost every town and city. There are ways that technology can help the drug stores of today to give the high service of days gone by.
One of the best ways for a pharmacy to gain respect and customer loyalty is to use automation. Pharmacy automation affords a business consistency and patient safety. The first and foremost reason for pharmacy automation is survival, not only survival, but pharmacy growth. Pharmacies get and retain a faithful following of customers by giving excellent personal service to every customer who comes into the business. There is no amount of money that can buy the goodwill developed over years of service from a very trustworthy business like a respected pharmacy. No doubt as this goodwill blossomed, the faithful customers of a such a store are creating the best form of advertising that a business can get. That advertising is word of mouth. The customers are telling everyone they know about the service that anyone can get at their respected pharmacy. To further develop a high service pattern, a neighborhood pharmacy can pay even closer attention to the needs of its customers. This increase in attention to customers can come from the availability the pharmacist has to deal with the customers one-on-one after being relieved from doing the all the mundane tasks of counting and measuring prescriptions. Pharmacy automation will afford him/her the ability to do this.
Usually a pharmacy will have peak hours early in the day and late in the afternoon or evening. These peaks of demand can cause a back log in the number of prescriptions that need to be filled quickly. Most of the time the customer wants to wait for the prescription, rather than make another trip to pick it up later. If prescriptions are filled manually it could take several minutes for a druggist to locate the drug that is prescribed, count or measure it out, label the bottle properly, and hand it over to a clerk to receive payment from the customer. This type pf scenario creates a pressure for the druggist to work as fast as possible to deliver prescriptions to waiting customers. Eventually the druggist will make a mistake. Studies have proven that people can attain only 85%+ accuracy in doing repetitive tasks. Actually it is very easy to determine if there might be a need for automation in a pharmacy. If during a peak time during the day the staff is unable to handle the load in a reasonable time, it is time to review the possibility of adding automation to the workforce. Definitely if the management is to the point of considering the employment of an additional pharmacist, then automation should be seriously considered. Patient safety is a second reason for pharmacy automation. There is no reason for a pharmacist to spend all of his/her work time counting and measuring, if there is an affordable solution that will take away these tasks. It is far more important for them to be available to answer questions and advise customers about drug interactions. Pharmacy automation can free them to do this.
Pharmacies have historically received 10 to 15 percent increase in demand for prescriptions filled annually. As time goes by, this trend is not expected to change. In fact it is very likely that the demand for prescriptions filled will increase by as much as 30 percent due to the government and insurance programs that are in place. With the allowance of the 90 day prescription coverage, the pressure for pharmacists to count and measure is increasing rapidly. Pharmacy automation can take the strain off the staff to perform these repetitions.
It is very likely that most pharmacists would rather work in an environment that would allow them to utilize the skills and knowledge that they have developed by taking rigorous training. Automation affords the pharmacist the opportunity to depend on the efficiency of the machines to do the numbing, repetitive tasks while performing more technical tasks. If there is a need to add a pharmacist to the staff at some time in the future, it would be easy to get the best and the brightest if the pharmacy relieved them from repetitive tasks by having automation. Far more likely, there will be no need to add another pharmacist to the staff, because pharmacy automation has reduced the work load while achieving a great deal of accuracy.