The Economics of Prescription Dispensing Systems

She added that, “the goal of the Script Center is not at all to move all of the pick-ups over to an automated device. The goal is to give an option to those consumers who are in every month, picking up the same prescription, and don’t need help; they’re in and out, and on their way.” This is advantageous to pharmacists because they are then able to devote more time to patients who have complex medical cases.

“Our role is to augment the pharmacy profession,” Schraut said. “We want to partner with the pharmacy profession. There are approximately 10,000 unique medications in the U.S. available to a patient and prescriber. We focus typically on about 100 unique medicines, with most of our clients focusing in on around 50 of those. The drugs we specialize in are typically one-time use drugs for limited duration. So we’re working traditionally with antibiotics and pain relief. So that’s why urgent care centers are a very unique partner with us, as well as emergency rooms and hospitals.”

Many states put different regulations on how physicians can dispense prescriptions. “The states are falling into two kinds now — either one that the physician dispenses because it’s their business or the second kind that says we’ll let physicians dispense, but they’ll have to purchase an annual dispensing license,” Schraut said.

What can present a problem is that each state’s interpretation of initial therapy is subjective. “When you think about Vicodin, which is the No. 1 pain relief medication in this country, initial therapy for someone that is 6-foot-6 and weighs 300 pounds, or someone who’s 5-foot-2 and 80 pounds could be vastly different,” Schraut described. “Initial therapy, some people might tell you that it’s six pills or tablets, others will tell you it’s enough for a week. So that’s where you get into some of that subjectivity, by state to state or facility to facility, we help match their prescribing habits with the regulations in that state.”

Besides saving time for patients, prescription dispensing machines also save pharmacists time. With salaries in the United States climbing over $100,000 per year for pharmacists, the time savings can mean significant cash savings. The vending machines could also mitigate pharmacist shortages by being available after hours.

Urgent Care

What’s drawing urgent care facilities to prescription dispensing machines? Many factors, Schraut said. Some are in rural areas, where the nearest pharmacy can be 50 miles or more away; for others the attraction to these machines is that they may give as much as a 10 to 20 percent revenue boost.

In large cities, the machines are used to enhance the “complete patient experience,” according to Schraut. “It’s a real time saver for a doctor and it gives both the doctor and pharmacist a chance to provide a higher standard of care by being more accessible to patients.”

But as he points out, one size doesn’t fit all. “There are literally plenty of options to use this type of product,” Schraut said.

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