You can speak to 10 different independent pharmacies, and likely, you will find at least 3-4 different workflows between them. Operating a pharmacy is not ‘one size fits all’. So your pharmacy software needs to be customizable and adaptable to change. We have seen many folks come from the chain pharmacy mentality, where they want as much as a 4 or 5 step workflow process, where the system requires as much as 2 levels of verification prior to it being bagged for sale at the point of sale. Many community pharmacies still want an open workflow, with no restraints, and the ability for the technician to do everything from entering the prescription, to adjudication with the insurance company, all the way to label and bagging. Winpharm offers the ability to have anything from an open-ended workflow, a 2 step, 3 step, 4 step, and even 5 step workflow that are all fully customizable. Our pharmacy software allows you to choose when the label prints, the requirements for verification, if you want to verify as a whole or step by step. It is so customizable that inside the pharmacy system, we have the queues associated with each step of workflow, where you can choose a color code and what it means as a status to your staff. This way, you can quickly identify the status of any prescription inside the workflow simply by looking at the color itself.
Our pharmacy management software allows for customization throughout your entire workflow including the option to build batches, manage deliveries using your own drivers or integrating with one of many delivery companies around the country. The pharmacy system can track a memo that can follow the prescription from one workflow queue to the next. Any good pharmacy software should have a workflow that offers a mobile delivery application that can tie into it. The ability to manage deliveries for those pharmacies that offer it, is key. Managing drivers, assigning orders to drivers, tracking the deliveries as well as the ability to track monies owed to the pharmacy from patients all needs to be carefully integrated. The pharmacy management software, the point of sale software, and the mobile delivery application all need to tie into one another so that start to finish, you know if a prescription was paid by insurance, if it was delivered or attempted delivery, and if it was delivered, was there a copay collected and due back to the pharmacy?
With common audits in independent pharmacy these days, verification of prescriptions has become more and more important. In Winpharm, if you use a 2 step or more in your workflow, we require verification. The verification in our pharmacy software can be used one of two ways, you can verify all of the data as a whole, and it will track who verified it and when. Or, you can require each step of the prescription be verified so make sure each area is being looked at carefully.
Workflow within a community pharmacy is not just about the flow of a prescription from start to finish, but its also the flow of work within the business for how things get done. Filling prescriptions should not always be a manual process. Using the automation inside of your pharmacy software is key to efficiency. So using technology such as automatic refill for your patients can free up your staffs time to work on other tasks within the pharmacy. Communication with your patients should also be automated through the pharmacy system, allowing for alerts and reminders regarding prescriptions ready for refill, not picked up yet, immunization alerts, and so much more also helps streamline your day to day processes.
Your pharmacy software solution should offer the ability to communicate with your patients through 2 way sms messaging, through a dedicated mobile application that ties into the pharmacy software, via email, and throughout outbound calling from an IVR system. The overall flow of work and operations within the pharmacy need to be efficient, especially with dwindling reimbursements from the PBM’s.
In conclusion, todays independent pharmacy is tasked with so many more tasks than in the past. As years go on, PBMs change their expectations, laws change, and profits are not as good as they use to be. So change needs to happen inside of each and every independent pharmacy workflow. Change to build efficiency and automation, so that you as an owner can accomplish more work, with less staff. Putting the pharmacy management software to work for you is key. If your pharmacy software does not offer a fully customizable suite, with a multitude of features that allow the system to work for you, its time to start shopping around! In todays day, technology needs to work for you, and if it does, it more than covers the cost of the pharmacy software solutions you implement into your business. Used properly, it should give you an amazing return on your investment.
Medication adherence has become a large focus within pharmacies over the last decade. Now, your reimbursements from CMS are tied directly to your star ratings, which in turn are tied to your performance in keeping your patients adherent to their medications. Lets face it, tying directly into medication adherence is the fact that your filling more prescriptions, which is better for the pharmacies bottom line. Pharmacists are already busy with so many tasks in any given day, so how can you effectively run your business while making sure your patients are getting their maintenance medications on time? If you harness the technology in your pharmacy software, its not that difficult to do!
Todays pharmacy management system has so many tools built into it that automate these processes, as well as make it easier for the patient to communicate and queue up their prescriptions for refill as well. The best pharmacy software systems on the market have countless features to make sure your patients are not running out of their medications, in turn making them non-adherent, and affecting your bottom line with regards to reimbursements. Datascan’s pharmacy computer system, as an example, has an adherence dashboard built in to identify patients that need attention. It also offers auto refill so that when the next fill comes due, it can auto fill it and place it in a queue to be dispensed from. For those patients not on auto refill, the pharmacy system can auto communicate with them to let them know a prescription is ready for refill via text, the MobileScripts app, through email, and even via outbound calling through an integrated IVR system. Once refilled, the same communications tools can be used to remind patients to pickup their medications, and send multiple reminders spaced out to make sure the patient is receiving them. For those pharmacies that offer delivery, our pharmacy software system also ties directly into our Mobile Delivery Application that makes setting up, tracking and delivery these prescriptions a breeze.
Many patients, especially those tied to star ratings on Medicare plans, find themselves on multiple maintenance medications that need to be refilled monthly. Our pharmacy software offers a few features to help combat this. Medication Synchronization has proven to raise adherence rates, simply for the fact that it means less trips to the pharmacy (or less deliveries to worry about if that is offered). Winpharm has a built in medication synchronization system that makes suggestions and helps you calculate the best way to get multiple medications to be ready for refill within a date range where they will get paid and not be too early to fill. That means filling them at the same time, and allowing pickup of all necessary meds in one trip.
When filling a maintenance medication in your pharmacy system, it needs to alert you if you are using the last refill for that drug, as well as give you an option to reach out to the Dr for a new medication with the click of a button! Datascans pharmacy system also has a maintenance medication utility built right in. This system can scan through patient profiles, find medications that have been filled within a certain timeframe, but have no refills left, and automatically send requests out to doctors. Once this happens, it parks all of these requests into a workable queue. When a doctor responds, it moves that RX to the central queue to be filled, or notifies you it has been rejected.
Formularies from PBM’s can make it difficult when a Doctor prescribes a medication needed by a patient to stay healthy. If the drug doesn’t fall on that formulary for that patients insurance, it now requires a prior authorization (a bogus pain in the rear end process used to make it unattractive to Drs and pharmacists, in the hope that you will simply choose one they prefer). Cover my Meds came to market to fix this, and any retail pharmacy software product on the market will have a direct integration with this. Our software also allows for an automatic PA process, so when a drug is rejected required PA, the system can start the process by synchronizing with CMM, auto filling out the proper form, and getting it over to the Dr for review quickly.
Many pharmacy software systems are also integrated with SureScripts for their Real Time Prescription Benefits Program (RTPB). When integrated, the pharmacy system synchronizes with the SS platform to help display drugs that are on the patients insurance formulary and/or alternate therapeutic options to help avoid what can sometimes be a lengthy prior authorization process. This helps get the patient out the door immediately with a drug to help start their treatment faster, and eliminates the need for them to come back.
In conclusion, if you are operating an independent pharmacy today, your pharmacy management software can directly affect your reimbursement levels with CMS. Used properly, the best pharmacy software on the market can automate processes to ensure your patients are getting their refills on time and staying adherent to the therapies prescribed to them by physicians. Overall, pharmacy systems can really aid in the overall health and outcomes for patients by ensuring they get their maintenance medications on time, and consistently. Lets face it, making profits in community pharmacy is not getting any easier. So why not employ the technology that your already paying for in your pharmacy computer system, and let it work for you!
Even the most robust, technology packed pharmacy software on the market has the need for third party integrations. In our industry, you have companies that offer interactive voice response systems (known as IVR’s), robotic dispensing products, scales (for measuring ingredients when building compounded prescriptions), electronic MAR systems (eMAR), different shipping companies, and the list goes on. A cutting-edge pharmacy management system will offer an independent pharmacy a limitless number of third party integrated solutions.
These solutions can range from products that help automate processes such as dispensing robots, to data feeds, pill counters, and even direct feeds to drug wholesalers for inventory replenishment via electronic ordering. Datascan’s pharmacy management software has over 75 third party integrations, and that number is constantly growing. Both WInpharm and our pharmacy Point of Sale system integrate with countless wholesale vendors that support EDI for electronic purchase orders, automatic replenishment, and auto update of inventory levels. Today’s modern independent pharmacy looks to automate and implement as much automation as possible. Pharmacy software systems need to offer integration to pill counting products, electronic scales for measuring ingredient’s, and robotic dispensing systems. A small startup community pharmacy may not need all of that expensive technology in the beginning, but through growth, they may find every day tasks are monopolizing their time.
In the pharmacy industry, there are multiple switch vendors such as Cover My Meds (formally Relay Health) and ERX (Formally Emdeon). Pharmacies need flexibility. The best pharmacy software on the market will offer such flexibility, for example, if your pharmacy wholesaler has a program linked to a specific switch partner, you can choose whats best for your business. Medication adherence has been a hot topic that pharmacy systems providers have worked hard to build tools within the pharmacy software to assist with. Higher adherence rates means better star ratings, more refills, which all translates into higher profits. Software for pharmacies must offer not only built in adherence tools, but interfaces to third parties that can also enhance the patient experience as well as offer additional reimbursements. Winpharm proudly offers integration with Outcomes/MTM for medication therapy management opportunities, we integrate directly with Prescribe Wellness for additional adherence tools, and we work with CPESN to offer clinical care opportunities that help small pharmacies with additional reimbursement opportunities.
Setting yourself apart from chain pharmacies will help keep your existing customer base, as well as hopefully bring in some clients that maybe are not happy with feeling like another number in a chain setting. Pharmacy software needs to be so much more than just software that helps dispense medication, generate labels, and keep patient history. Offering delivery options to your patients is surely something that is traditionally unique to community pharmacy. We make sure to offer a robust electronic delivery application (available on both Apple IOS and Android) that ties directly into our pharmacy systems, including our POS for checkout. On top of our own solution, for those clients that want to outsource for deliveries, we currently have integrations to 5 delivery companies around the U.S. and growing.
Compounding pharmacies building their own compound medications will use scales from companies such as Ohaus to help measure ingredients accurately. The Winpharm pharmacy computer system integrates directly with these scales, even allowing for multiple scales on the same network. As you look to expand your business outside of traditional retail, many look to LTC (long term care) facilities where you can serve a multitude of patients in one location. A good pharmacy software system will allow the ability to cross over into compounding and LTC without requiring additional modules you pay for. Our retail pharmacy software also accommodates, at no additional charge, the LTC model. In fact, on top of offering MAR printing and management internally, we also currently integrate with 3 eMAR vendors, with quite a few more coming in the near future. Again, offering flexibility to our clients.
There are a number of data feeds on the market, from Asembia for specialty pharmacy, to aggregators like IQVIA that report de identified data back to pharmaceutical manufacturers.
Running an independent pharmacy today requires up to date technology that offers real flexibility. Pharmacy software is just the beginning of your ‘technology adventure’. The best pharmacy software on the market will offer third party integrations of all kinds, from bagging systems to pill counters, from IVR technology to delivery systems and beyond. While you may feel that you do not need some of this technology today, you never know what opportunities tomorrow brings. Living in a world that is built around speed and convenience, retail pharmacy software systems need to offer and integrate with tools that offer these to your patients. Remember, your competitors are offering these conveniences, so your pharmacy and your pharmacy management system must also!
Maximizing efficiency for pharmacy claims billing:
The complex process of pharmacy billing involves submitting and processing insurance claims for prescription drugs and other pharmaceutical items. This procedure can be difficult and time-consuming, especially for independent pharmacy owners and managers who must juggle multiple responsibilities at once. In order to handle this process effectively, having a robust pharmacy management software backed by a support team that understands insurance billing is imperative. The ability to stop or control losses, as well a get prescription claims paid quickly, will affect your bottom line as well as patient satisfaction with your services.
Pharmacy Software ease of use for billing claims:
Any pharmacy management system can ‘handle’ billing insurance claims for prescription drugs and other pharmaceuticals – but that is just the beginning. How easy is it to use? How long does it take to train your staff on how to bill these claims? Verifying insurance coverage, filing claims, handling rejections and denials, updating patient insurance, the ability to bill COB claims as well as easy identify and repair issues — are all part of the day to day for any pharmacist or pharmacy technician. When Datascan moved from their old DOS based system over to a Windows based pharmacy software, we made sure that efficiency was key. The software displays the fields in order, one by one as you go through the fill process –without just displaying 20-30 fields on the screen all at once, like our competitors do. The ability to fill prescriptions using only a keyboard and keystrokes — not requiring a mouse at all, was key. The more information we could share about a patient, drug and doctor on the fill screen, the easier it is to quickly fill prescriptions in volume without having to bounce around to other screens or tabs.
The software has options for built in hard stops to help avoid rejected claims or audit issues later on such as a built in DAW check, confirmation of date written, and a series of color coded interaction and allergy warnings to avoid slowing you down. Electronic prescriptions are filled with ease, minimizing keystrokes but also allowing for verification. If a patient queues up an RX using the Datascan mobile application or by calling in through an IVR, it auto queues up in your central fill queue for filling in order that they came in. A quick click of a button and the fill screen is up with most or all of the data needed to fill that rx. The average user of Winpharm, our pharmacy management software, says they were comfortable and could easily fill prescriptions using our software with under an hour of training.
Focusing on speed, ease of use, the ability to quickly identify the status of a RX, or warning, the amount of data we present users at one time, and the field by field prompt have aided in our success and that of our customers for decades.
Pharmacy System Features to avoid or minimize losses on prescription claims:
When you bill an insurance company (or PBM) for your patient’s prescriptions and get paid profitable, with no issues, sometimes it may feel like hitting the jackpot. The number of reasons and rejections seems to grow every year. Couple that with reimbursements below cost, at cost, COB claims, and even requirements for prior authorizations – and filling prescriptions just became a lot more complicated.
Pre and Post Edits: Our software has a series of pre edit warnings and checks to assist with preventing unpaid claims and audit issues in the future. We also have a series of customizable post edit warnings that you can set to trigger such as paid at or below cost, paid equal to or above usual and customary (potential U&C issue), warn if you are paid a custom percentage off AWP, we allow you to require a minimum profit, and also have DIR thresholds you can set. If any of these warnings are triggered, we stop the label from printing and the software color codes the prescription to warn of a reimbursement warning— so you can easily identify and work these claims to hopefully rectify the profit issue.
DIR & GER Fees: Datascan pharmacy software system has built in, DIR and GER fee estimators. Not only can you report for a period of time to set expectations for these fees, but live, right after the claim adjudication is complete, we show you the range of payment based on historical fees for this particular insurance/pbm plan.
Patient Profit Picture: Winpharm has built into it, our patient profit picture. This allows you to quickly see the historic profitability for each patient, include their family members purchase history, and this can display post claim adjudication. So, if you are getting a negative reimbursement, you can dig into the profitability of the patient long term to see if you are losing money overall, or not making much at all.
Organization and color coding of claims: Whether you look in our daily log (of all prescriptions filled for a particular day), or in our organized To Do queue, any rejected prescriptions, or those stopped because of a reimbursement warning, are easy to identify and work through in an organized fashion.
Automatic COB Billing: Our pharmacy system has the ability to automate your COB claims and display both responses, as well as create ease of use for reporting and looking back historically at these claims.
Automatic PA Submissions: Datascan partnered with Cover My Meds years back to help automate the Prior Authorization process for prescriptions. Now, when a PA rejection is received, the process is automatically started for you. We put this into a queue for you to be able to manage and follow up on any PA’s that have not been responded to or resolved.
Pharmacy Software Vendor Live Support, and how it effects insurance claim billing:
Many times, when filling a prescription, you come across a rejection that you simply can not get past. Patients need their prescriptions in a timely manner, and if your pharmacy can not deliver, you run the risk of another one taking that business away. Pharmacy Benefit Managers and insurance companies are constantly adding requirements, and new rejections as to why a claim is not paid. When all else fails, you need the ability to get help, and quickly.
When you call Datascan for assistance with any of our pharmacy software products, we typically answer the phone within 60 seconds or less. Our staff is fully trained in all areas of our software, including claims adjudication assistance. Even if we hit a wall getting your prescription paid with our knowledge base, we can get on a conference call with you and the plan to get things done!
In conclusion, it really is true that the right technology and company behind your pharmacy management system is the key to your success. Employing pharmacy systems that are built efficiently, and help you quickly fill prescriptions is important, but equally as important is having a great support team that responds quickly. We encourage any independent pharmacy owner to do a demo, read our reviews, and really find out what makes Datascan Pharmacy Software so different.
Today’s pharmacy software needs to do so much more than just fill prescriptions. While most retail pharmacy software systems will build in features to help manage your business, the best software for pharmacies will provide additional features that help you do even more. Fully integrated mobile applications help your pharmacy operate at peak performance. Patient apps are not only a convenience to the patient, but offer benefits to the pharmacy as well. Mobile refill applications help patients with medication adherence and compliance and also build profits in your retail pharmacy by making it quick and easy for patients to request refills. Patient mobile applications can also expand your reach and make it easy for you to stay connected to patients. Mobile delivery systems, which are fully integrated into your pharmacy computer system streamline your patient home deliveries. Some of the best pharmacy software delivery systems have robust features like route tracking, payment processing, and even driver tipping. Nowadays patients expect conveniences—between the speed of Amazon and Netflix, your retail pharmacy needs to offer up quick and easy conveniences that help patients get what they need quickly and easily – such as queueing up a refill in a matter of seconds by clicking a button in the mobile app that will send that fill directly into your working queue in the pharmacy management software.
Patient mobile applications help you stay connected with your patients and gives them better insight into their medication profiles in your pharmacy software. By offering them an integrated app right on their smart phones, you can make sure you’re able to easily reach out for important reminders or notifications from the pharmacy. Datascan’s MobileScripts application integrates right into your pharmacy management software so when it comes time to send messages to patients they pop right up on their phone. You can send alerts to patients for things like refill reminders when a medication is due, ready for pickup alerts, adherence alerts, birthday messages, and even custom 2-way messaging. Some of the best pharmacy computer systems provide additional features within their mobile apps to provide even more conveniences to patients. Datascan’s mobile application allows patients to make payments for their prescriptions, send pictures of drivers licenses, insurance cards, and prescriptions, and even allows them to update their demographic information.
Pharmacists have become responsible for ensuring patient medication adherence and compliance, so having integrated patient mobile applications helps manage this. Your pharmacy software system streamlines things like automatically refilling maintenance drugs and queuing up refill requests to doctors, but providing patients with an app that allows them to view their profile and easily request refills helps them to better manage their prescriptions and coordinate care with your pharmacy staff. Mobile applications that are synched with patient profiles in your pharmacy management software will allow patients to track prescriptions statuses and know exactly when it’s time for a refill, making it quick and easy to send a request. Mobile refill requests are queued up right in your pharmacy software and you can even choose to completely automate the process and have refills move directly to a dispense or production queue. Easy to use mobile applications help your pharmacy fill more prescriptions per patient every single day.
If your pharmacy is offering home delivery, using a mobile delivery application not only saves you time, but also streamlines your entire delivery process. Android and iOS based delivery applications that are integrated with your pharmacy management and point of sale software helps organize and track prescriptions enroute to your patients. By making it easy for patient’s to receive the medications, you can help build more compliance that ultimately helps your pharmacy with star ratings and bigger profits. Of course using features such as automatic refill and medication synchronization are hugely beneficial when it comes time to adherence, pharmacies must also consider that patients may not be able to make it in to the pharmacy to pick up medications on time, or simply prefer having their prescriptions delivered.
While pharmacy software systems may offer integrations with third party delivery applications, using the application offered by your pharmacy software vendor offers a tremendous amount of convenience for both you and your patients. Datascan’s mobile delivery application makes it easy to not only set up deliveries, but track and manage deliveries and drivers once they are enroute. Mobile delivery allows the pharmacy to reroute drivers if necessary and even sends alert to patients when they’re next up for delivery. Patients can conveniently make payments right at their door via credit card or cash, add tips for their drivers, and receive proof of delivery via email or text. Patients can request counseling and pharmacists will be notified right in their pharmacy system. Using a mobile delivery software opens up the door to seamless deliveries!
Mobile applications undoubtedly offer conveniences to both pharmacy staff and patients alike. The best pharmacy software systems will provide fully integrated robust applications on iOS and Android platforms to help you stay connected with patients, build better medication adherence, and fill more prescriptions. Mobile Delivery Applications that sync with your pharmacy computer system will offer additional conveniences for patients and pharmacy staff every single day. Gone are the days of patients having to pick up the phone to call in refills, or your pharmacy having to print out paper delivery sheets. For your pharmacy to stay competitive it’s essential that you offer these conveniences to patients.
