Walgreens, like some other national drugstore chains, wants to be seen as part of a healthcare network first rather than a convenient general store with prescription meds. CVS Health made the first rebranding move. Although its collaboration with Theranos marks Walgreens’ most high-profile move in that direction, there are other things the national chain has been doing to make this transition. Dr. Alan London, vice president of strategic clinical partnerships with Walgreens, talked about some of them in a panel discussion about changing the mindset of patients, at a healthcare technology conference in New York this week.
The conference examined how physicians payers and startups are working with patients. It was organized by Dr. Milena Adamian of Life Science Angel Network and Lisa Suennen of Venture Valkyrie.
Collaborations with physicians
Behavioral Health, Interoperability and eConsent: Meeting the Demands of CMS Final Rule Compliance
In a webinar on April 16 at 1pm ET, Aneesh Chopra will moderate a discussion with executives from DocuSign, Velatura, and behavioral health providers on eConsent, health information exchange and compliance with the CMS Final Rule on interoperability.
London said drugstores with clinics were increasingly seen as a source of care. Many patients may want to see a medical professional, but it takes too long to get an appointment with their primary care physician, and they can’t afford to miss work. So they can come after hours and at the weekend when it’s convenient for them. “Instead of seeing us as competitors, doctor offices are beginning to partner with us,” he noted. He also pointed out that it is seeing an increasing number of customers with chronic conditions — Walgreens began offering a service to diagnose and treat chronic conditions in its clinics last year. Diabetics visited the store an average of 20 times a year. By sharing these touch points, physician practices and companies like Walgreens can get a fuller picture of their patients/customers. Seniors represent another opportunity for cross collaboration. Another example of this is Walgreen’s collaboration with a physicians’ group in Arizona earlier this year.
Health and wellness incentives
Taking a page from employer wellness programs, Walgreens rolled out Balance Rewards a little more than a year ago to encourage and motivate healthy behavior. The idea is to reward customers for meeting their health and fitness goals through activity trackers for running, cycling and swimming as well as blood glucose monitors, Bluetooth-connected scales and blood pressure cuffs. It has developed several partners for the program such as Misfit, Jawbone, Fitbit and iHealth.
Pharmacy chat line
A Deep-dive Into Specialty Pharma
A specialty drug is a class of prescription medications used to treat complex, chronic or rare medical conditions. Although this classification was originally intended to define the treatment of rare, also termed “orphan” diseases, affecting fewer than 200,000 people in the US, more recently, specialty drugs have emerged as the cornerstone of treatment for chronic and complex diseases such as cancer, autoimmune conditions, diabetes, hepatitis C, and HIV/AIDS.
One of the things pharmacies have discovered as they ramp up their healthcare profile is that they can play to their strengths and at the center of that is their pharmacists. Several drugstores, such as Rite Aid, CVS and Walgreens, have set up chat lines — in which pharmacists can answer customer queries on medication — in the past few years.
It will be interesting to see if Walgreens’ and other pharmacies’ vision of themselves as health centers means they’ll clear their shelves of the candy and soda as well.
