Dr. Leke Agbejule BPharm, MSc, PharmD joins the Pharmacy Podcast Nation to talk about Innovation with a Lyft Uber and Amazon spin.
With increased advances in Telemedicine & BlockChain technologies, the landscape of community pharmacy is rapidly changing. These changes, albeit, subtle now, have the propensity to disturb the status quo as we know it today.
It’s a known secret that more prescribers are adopting telemedicine and this trend is only getting expanded into various specialties. This ability has enabled the opportunity to have prompt wholesome medical care in areas hitherto considered to be remote. It’s estimated that there are 266 million cell phone subscribers in the US alone. Opportunities and solutions going forward will have to leverage this medium to reach the majority of healthcare consumers. What does this mean? Many pharmacy patrons have a new world open to them. Currently, 82% of patients pick up their prescriptions in the pharmacy either in person or via a representative. Digital adoption of patrons is key.
Patients are now able to request a refill, pick up medications from the comforts of their palms using their smartphones, and other wifi enabled devices such as AlexaR
This article will explore the possible incursion scenarios of the players in this space.
Amazon
With the direct acquisition of PillPackR, Amazon has positioned itself to be a force to be reckoned with in the pharmacy delivery space. It’s no secret that Amazon simply has mastered the art and science of prompt delivery {Amazon Prime} and regular batch delivery! Amazon fosters a lot of relationships within its ecosystem to such an extent that they participate in almost all segments of the supply chain. Amazon is a strong contender in the sense that they can leverage {and perhaps will} Whole Foods foot print to reach out to prospective pharmacy patrons. Almost every household has an Amazon account and almost 65% of those have Amazon Prime. This enormous market share is bound to turn the industry on its head. Alternatively, Amazon May explore leveraging independent pharmacies to fulfil their patients’ prescription needs.
Besides the use of PillPackR to fulfill customers maintenance medication monthly, Amazon will now deal with how to handle acute prescriptions delivery. With the expansion of evisits, we are beginning to see Complete End to End Digital Medicine {CEEDM]. There are more people using medical apps on their phones to consult with a medical healthcare provider and have such prescriptions sent to the patient’s pharmacy of choice. Upon completion, the pharmacy sends the patient a text message and the prescription gets picked up. Today, this may take about 24 to 48 hours to have the medication in the hands of the end consumer. The goal by these operators is to shorten the lag time to approximately 4 hours. It will be ideal for a patient to start their antibiotic treatment within 2 hours of consulting with a healthcare provider.
This will try to capture the pathway for Amazon into this space. Approximately 54% of prescriptions filled in most metropolitan pharmacies are for new acute therapies secondary to recent consultations. These essentially represent the scripts Amazon will be going for. AlexaR will enable such prescriptions to be picked up immediately they are ready at the pharmacy and have them delivered. There are talks Amazon may partner with Lyft or Uber to carry out the delivery. This couldn’t be corroborated. Our consultants believe this is a feasible approach. This approach will definitely leverage the already established logistics infrastructure of Uber/Lyft
Uber
It is believed UberEats is simply a precursor to UberScripts or UberRx. The online car ride-sharing model is poised to penetrate the pharmacy delivery space. Almost everyone has a Uber account and most have had to use this service either sparingly or on a regular basis. The need to move into this niche is very attractive to both Uber and Lyft both have the same service