How Technology Benefits Specialty Pharmacy | AMCP 2024
Kristen Whelchel, Pharm.D., CSP, Research and Patient Care Improvement Pharmacist with Vanderbilt Specialty Pharmacy's Department of Health Outcomes and Research, explains how technology identifies at-risk patients, coordinates medication refills and more.
Kristen Whelchel, Pharm.D., CSP, Research and Patient Care Improvement Pharmacist with Vanderbilt Specialty Pharmacy's Department of Health Outcomes and Research gave some examples of how technology has leveraged patient care at her institution.
“We created a dashboard that would help the pharmacist identify patients who had no refills left on their prescription and would need safety monitoring labs before they could get their next refill,” Whelchel said.
As a result, the percentage of patients with care gaps went from 80% to 32%.
Whelchel said they also implemented another program that studied patients’ refill requests in relation to already upcoming appointments, to see if the patient had enough medication to make it to the next appointment.
“Pharmacists postponed about 8% of refill renewal requests,” Whelchel explained. “Of those, 98% resulted in some kind of change after the patient had their follow up and that equated to around $550,000 in avoided costs if those prescriptions had been filled.”
Whelchel spoke this week at AMCP Nexus, held at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas. She co-led the session titled, ‘Advancing Patient Care and Demonstrating Value in Specialty Pharmacy Using Technology and Data Driven Quality Improvement Solutions.’
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