Experts: Leveraging Local Insights to Address Pharmacy Deserts

Jenni Zilka, president of Good Neighbor Pharmacy at Cencora, and John Stefankiewicz, vice president of Enterprise Analytics at Cencora, discuss how pharmacists can play a vital role in transitioning patients from acute care settings to home care, helping to prevent readmissions. Pharmacists' deep integration into their local communities, especially at independent pharmacies, provides opportunities to connect patients with valuable resources like food security programs. Additionally, they emphasize the importance of collaboration across the health care ecosystem, including independent and chain pharmacies, technology vendors, and advocacy groups.

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Q: How can pharmacies collaborate with other health care providers and organizations to address gaps in care and improve patient outcomes?

Jenni Zilka: I think there's opportunities abound, and there's some of the more obvious opportunities, like as a patient is transitioning out of an acute care setting it back into their home, or living at home, but needing some additional care, our pharmacists can provide such a value, they can plug into the overall health care ecosystem to play such a valuable role in caring for these patients as they transition into their home and they see these pharmacists, and have access to these pharmacists on a regular basis. So wewhen we talk about deserts, if that pharmacist isn't there to help that patient transition out of an acute care setting into their home setting, they oftentimes end up back in the acute care setting, right? So they have such an amazing opportunity to collaborate with the health care providers, and they do this all day, every day, organically, right? They're reaching out to physicians' offices and confirming and double checking prescriptions, and at times, often making recommendations as well, but I think they can, at times, take those relationships even a step further to really, truly care for the patient.

Then I also think another opportunity, as you mentioned, is community organizations. I'll use food security, as or food insecurity, as an example, and a lot of times, some of these underserved communities do have resources for food insecurity, and when the pharmacy is aware of those, and there's certainly a reliance on nutrition to disease states and clinical outcomes. So being able to tie those together and ensure that patients are aware of what's available in their community and that they're closely connected with their community. They can help care for those patients and direct them to the resources that are available to them. So kind of looking at it through a couple different lenses, there's a health care connection with other health care providers, but the community organizations can also be really important, and our pharmacies, organically, already do such an amazing job. I mean they really are so integrated in their communities, especially our independent pharmacies, so they're already doing that, but there may be opportunities for them to even expand upon that as we look forward into the future.

John Stefankiewicz: I think what's interesting about our organization is our scale and essentially our position within the health care value chain. So even partnering with [Good Neighbor Pharmacy (GNP)], we can provide a lot of solutions at that local level while also advocate at the state and national level on behalf of these pharmacies. Understanding that it's all going to happen that we're all going to have to work together to solve this critical problem. There's not one solution out in the marketplace that's going to address pharmacy deserts.

Jenni Zilka: That's a great call out John, and I think that concept of everybody together is how we are going to solve for this is really important. It's our independent pharmacies, it's our chain and retail pharmacies, it's Cencora and it's other tool tech vendors, et cetera, but we all have to do this together, and I think if we do that, we can be really successful. It's a great call out.

Q: Can data be used to predict future trends in pharmacy closures and identify areas at risk of becoming pharmacy deserts?

John Stefankiewicz: The short answer is yes. Data and analytics can go ahead and provide trend analysis of pharmacy deserts in the future, but we actually don't need to do those types of analysis, right? So if you look back 5 or 10 years, there's a lot less pharmacies today than there was in the past, and all the major chains have already announced closures coming in the next couple years. We can go ahead and spend our resources looking to identify where these deserts are, but really our focus is on providing solutions at that local level, right? So we're working with GNP to essentially look at the current conditions of the pharmacy deserts, understanding the stores and demographics and the geographies where these deserts are impacting the lives of so many patients, and we're essentially looking to activate solutions at that local level. I think, again, what's interesting about Cencora is our scale, right? So we can test solutions pretty rapidly across different geographies.

Q: What should pharmacists be looking for to help pinpoint gaps in care for their patients and communities?

John Stefankiewicz: This may be an odd answer, I would say, to be open minded. Essentially, we commend community pharmacy every day for having that phenomenal relationship with the patients and knowing everyone walking through the door, and that's what you're trying to essentially encourage. We found, in some cases, like that, when you show the pharmacy essentially the geographic makeup of the store, it may not align to sort of the folks that are walking in the store. There's gaps in internal data sets, and if you're relying only on your sales purchases or your prescription data, you're going to not see essentially those communities that are in need and essentially that are not accessing care at that store level. I think that's been eye opening to some of the pharmacies where we've piloted some of these analytics with with them that they're so taken back by the community that may be on the other side of the the bridge, on the other side of the highway that is, or maybe a little bit outside that sort of that 20 mile radius, whatever that radius may be, that the store may be closed by the time they get there. So I think that's kind of showing them that other side has been really impactful.

Jenni Zilka: John makes such a great point, because our pharmacy owners, especially in the independent space, are pharmacists. They're taking care of patients, 60 to 70 hours a week, and they know who their patients are, but wherever we can leverage our scale to say, "hey, let's take a look at who's not your patients who's not walking in the pharmacy, and let's really understand who they are and where you can help fill a gap." And an example to John's point was across a freeway. The patients across the freeway weren't coming into the pharmacy that we worked with and I think they identified that, and then were able to advertise and leverage, like John said, the resources that we have available to them now, even if it's another pharmacy just started marketing and advertising in another language to ensure that their patient-base knew of the services that they're providing. So it really is a combination of leveraging that scale and then really deploying at the local level, and it's really, really been rewarding and enjoyable to watch our pharmacies expand in that way.

Q: Is there anything else you would like to add?

John Stefankiewicz: I just want to reiterate, it's really about partnerships, right? It's leveraging all the resources available, the resources within Cencora or whatever organization supports it. There's not one solution in the marketplace that's going to make these pharmacies more financially viable. The trend, I think, is more elevated than ever. The trend is unfortunate, but I think there's been a sort of a call on action from advocacy, and I think you're starting to see government officials starting to understand the crisis that's at stake, but it's only going to really be soft by partnering locally, nationally, even at the state level.

Jenni Zilka: I would just add that was a pretty strong close. I don't know if I can, if I can, add a lot to but I would just add that at Cencora and Good Neighbor Pharmacy, we so wholeheartedly and passionately believe in these independent pharmacy providers that are out there caring for their communities that we will continue to advocate and we will continue to build solutions, and we will continue to leverage our scale to help enable them in any way that we can and continue to work with them, really truly, work with our pharmacies to help develop solutions that will help them engage with their patients and continue to do the amazing work that they do.