September 15, 2004
New system will include more information, better safety measures
Greetings to all of our patients and members of our community,
We hope that this summer has been a productive and enjoyable one. During this time, the Pharmacy has been undergoing many changes. We, the staff, have been working diligently in addressing issues and updating processes to ensure continuing improvement in the delivery of quality services.
In order to accomplish this, we are constantly looking at ways to operate more efficiently while providing our patients with the best pharmacy care. This includes more information about your medications in a timely manner.
As we implement our new pharmacy system, you will notice several changes in the services that you receive. The labels on the medications will have more information, including your address, another means of confirming accuracy, and expiration dates for your prescriptions.
You will also receive drug information leaflets with each prescription, including your refills. The pharmacists are also available, in person or by telephone, to answer your questions about your medications. They will be reviewing your medication profiles for interactions and adverse reactions with the additional aid of the most updated and available information provided by our new system. We value you as the patient and consider patient safety a key factor involving all pharmacy activities.
Another improvement made in the pharmacy is the ability to process pharmacy claims online. For the patient, this means that if you are covered under a prescription plan through your employer, by means of a separate prescription card, we will be able to bill your insurance company immediately.
Although some local employers may not currently have this option for their employees' prescription coverage, we hope to be able to help those that are eligible at this time.
Non-beneficiaries will be responsible for medication costs that are not covered by online claims processing. We would like to remind everyone to bring in your prescription cards if applicable.
Our pharmacy staff's most daunting task at this time is transferring the medication information into the new system. We ask for your understanding and patience as this will be an ongoing project over the next few months.
Because we will be working with two separate databases, wait times will increase temporarily until all of the information is transferred over. Whenever possible, please call 48 hours in advance for refills to avoid increased wait times when picking up your medications.
We hope this message serves to help explain what our goals are in the pharmacy and how this will affect you, as the patient, in the near future.
Quyana,
The Pharmacy Staff