Drug Topics - February 2009 - (Page 12)

Up front INDUSTRY NEWS & ANALYSIS Tennessee university opens drive-thru pharmacy Last month the Health, Wellness and Recreation Center at Middle Tennessee State University opened a pharmacy that features a drive-thru window. The pharmacy will serve the MTSU community and will be open Monday through Friday. “We’re excited to be serving MTSU students, staff, and faculty,” said Tabby Ragland, the university’s director of pharmacy. “We plan to keep prices as low as possible.” The pharmacy features an automated telephone system. Patients will also be able to order re lls online. In addition to lling prescriptions, the pharmacy will offer OTC items such as cold and cough preparations, foot-care products, vitamins, antacids, and rst aid items. MTSU students, staff, and faculty will be able to ll prescriptions on campus RETAIL CHAINS LEGISLATIVE Rite Aid ned for record-keeping violations Federal officials recently approved a settlement with Rite Aid Corp. in which the drug chain and subsidiaries in eight states agreed to pay $5 million in civil penalties for alleged violations of the Controlled Substances Act. Ofﬁcials from the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) said they found a “pattern of violations” during an investigation of 53 Rite Aid locations. DEA officials said some Rite Aid employees knowingly ﬁlled prescriptions for controlled substances when they knew those prescriptions were not issued for a legitimate medical reason. Violations were found at Rite Aid pharmacies in California, Kentucky, New Jersey, New York, Maryland, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Virginia. More than half the pharmacies cited, 32, were in California. As part of the settlement, Rite Aid agreed to improve its record-keeping in connection with cold medications, which are sometimes used to manufacture methamphetamine. “We fully cooperated with the DEA and the U.S. Department of Justice since being notiﬁed of the situation in 2004,” Rite Aid spokeswoman Cheryl Slavinsky told the Sacramento Bee. “We have strengthened our existing compliance program and retrained our pharmacy staffs on each of these issues.” Rite Aid has agreed to quarterly audits and a tracking system that links its pharmacies across the country, according to Sacramento DEA chief Gordon Taylor. According to the DEA, criminals who manufacture methamphetines often hire people to go to pharmacies to buy the daily limit of pseudoephedrine and ephedrine products at each one — a process known as smurﬁng. Taylor said most of the pseudoephedrine and ephedrine seized by the DEA during raids had been gained by criminals through smurﬁng. South Dakota lawmakers approve telepharmacy plan The South Dakota legislature has cleared the way for pharmacists to use technicians to ﬁll prescriptions at remote locations where there are no pharmacists. Still, several lawmakers warned that lawsuits might result if standards on what constitutes “limited access” are not established. Under the telepharmacy law, pharmacists will communicate with patients and supervise pharmacy technicians at remote sites through audio-visual networks. The technicians will ﬁll the prescriptions. Some legislators have urged the state Board of Pharmacy to establish deﬁnite standards determining which communities have limited access to pharmacists, stipulating the types of drugs that can be dispensed remotely, and determining whether multiple providers would be allowed to provide telepharmacy services in the same community. W W W.D R U GTO P I C S .C O M 12 DRUG TOPICS Februar y 2009 http://WWW.DRUGTOPICS.COM

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Drug Topics - February 2009 Contents Health-System Edition Group Attempts to Resurrect Pain Care Act HSE Business Management HSE Clinical Letters Up Front Up Front in Depth Community Practice Niche Pharmacies Serve Special Populations Special Report Oral Oncology Drugs New Drugs Update 2008 Approvals OTC New Products Viewpoint

Drug Topics - February 2009

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