Episode 5: Is There Value to Specialty Pharmacy Accreditation?

Ray Tancredi, RPh, MBA, CSP, vice president of specialty pharmacy development at Walgreens; Cheryl Allen, BS Pharm, MBA, vice president of business development and industry relations for Diplomat Pharmacy; Nicholas Karalis, RPh, of Elwyn Pharmacy Group; Stacey Ness, PharmD, RPh, CSP, MSCS, AAHIVP, director of specialty clinical services for Managed Healthcare Associates*; and Renee Rayburg, RPh, senior director of clinical consulting at Artemetrx, discuss the ramifications of accreditation for a specialty pharmacy.

Even though accreditation is not mandatory, Allen pointed out that it may be tacitly required in a way, since payor networks and pharmaceutical manufacturers use accreditation to make decisions about specialty pharmacies.

Accrediting bodies such as the Utilization Review Accreditation Committee (URAC) review all aspects of an organization’s policies and procedures, from human resources to disaster planning. The panelists agreed that accreditation can benefit specialty pharmacies by instituting consistent monitoring of quality parameters.

*The views expressed are those of the individual alone and not of Managed Health Care Associates, Inc.