Drug Topics - July 28, 2008 - (Page 3) www.drugtopics.com JULY 28, 2008 DRUG TOPICS 3 Of Interest to Pharmacists E-prescribing's return on investment far outweighs costs to R.Ph.s Martin Sipkoff N o question exists as to whether e-prescribing will be widely adopted—it’s a matter of when. Recent events, including new federal regulations and the recent merger of the two largest electronicprescription networks, imply it is not far off. Pharmacists are leading the way, to their economic advantage. “We have made a great deal of progress on the pharmacists’ side,” said Ken Whittemore Jr., R.Ph., senior VP for clinical practice integration at SureScripts, the pharmacy-founded organization that runs the Pharmacy Health Information Exchange (PHIE). “The feeling that it’s an idea whose time has come is accurate. The interest of all stakeholders will make it work.” Significant development has occurred since SureScripts was founded by the National Association of Chain Drug Stores (NACDS) and the National Community Pharmacists Association (NCPA) seven years ago. Since 2004, more than 50 million prescriptions have been transmitted electronically—35 million last year. SureScripts predicts that 100 million prescription transactions will be processed this year, about 7% of all prescriptions with potential for electronic transmission. Industry insiders believe that widespread adoption of e-prescribing is inevitable. have been running highly successful e-prescribing pilot projects. “We’ve learned a lot,” said Steve Fox, VP of provider network management for BCBSMA. “We’re using those lessons as a blueprint to a wider deployment within the provider network.” Pharmacists view e-prescribing as important to improving quality, safety, efficiency, and consumer convenience, said Whittemore. They’re willing to spend money to upgrade hardware and software and to train E-prescribing infrastructure The single most important development advancing e-prescribing is the merger of RxHub and SureScripts announced July 1. The owners of RxHub and SureScripts each own half of the new company, which will be called SureScripts-RxHub LLC. Once the merger is complete, physicians will be able to accesss drug coverage and medication histories on more than 200 million patients—an improvement over the current fragmented network, which gives an incomplete clinical picture and access to fewer pharmacies. According to officials of the merged company, the merged network could boost the number of e-prescriptions to more than 100 million this year. And the hundreds of e-prescribing software companies should benefit from an integrated testing and approval process. Improvements in infrastructure development, vendor certification, and standards development were occurring even before the merger. Health plan, health systems, and other market-based initiatives are encouraging adoption. Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts and Blue Cross Blue Shield of Tennessee, for example, Pharmacy benefit managers strongly committed The merger of RxHub and SureScripts joins two powerful information networks. RxHub’s National Patient Health Information Network (PHIN) provides prescribers with patient-specific medication history and pharmacy benefit information on more than 200 million patients—two out of three Americans. Pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs) are among the strongest supporters of e-prescribing because providing this information to physicians and pharmacists allows for informed prescribing decisions, including formulary and benefits design, and the availability of generic or other lowercost substitutions. That improves compliance rates, an issue of economic importance to pharmacists. RxHub was founded in February 2001 by the three major PBMs. It delivers a standardized communication framework that links prescribers, mail-order pharmacies, PBMs, and benefits plans for the purpose of sharing benefit information and exchanging prescriptions electronically. RxHub now works with more than 60 technology partners and nearly 20 PBMs, payers, and health plans that provide managed care, Medicare Part D, and Medicaid plan services. Integration of the patient data available through PHIN and the prescriptions transmitted over SureScripts’ Pharmacy Health Information Exchange (PHIE) is a major goal, said SureScripts’ Ken Whittemore Jr., R.Ph. “We anticipate significant progress in this area.” Photography: Alex Wong / Getty Images http://www.drugtopics.com
Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Drug Topics - July 28, 2008 Drug Topics - July 28, 2008 Contents E-Prescribing's Return on Investment Far Outweighs Cost to R.Ph.s Medication Compliance Failure is Costly But Avertable Most Common Reasons for Noncompliance Drug Topics - July 28, 2008 Drug Topics - July 28, 2008 - Contents (Page 1) Drug Topics - July 28, 2008 - Contents (Page 2) Drug Topics - July 28, 2008 - E-Prescribing's Return on Investment Far Outweighs Cost to R.Ph.s (Page 3) Drug Topics - July 28, 2008 - E-Prescribing's Return on Investment Far Outweighs Cost to R.Ph.s (Page 4) Drug Topics - July 28, 2008 - Medication Compliance Failure is Costly But Avertable (Page 5) Drug Topics - July 28, 2008 - Most Common Reasons for Noncompliance (Page 6)
For optimal viewing of this digital publication, please enable JavaScript and then refresh the page. If you would like to try to load the digital publication without using Flash Player detection, please click here.