Edgewood, KY— St. Elizabeth Healthcare has opened a new specialty pharmacy location at 850 Thomas More Parkway in Edgewood (site of former Fifth Third Bank).
The specialty pharmacy program allows St. Elizabeth to fill prescriptions for critical and complex conditions, such as cancer, HIV, and Hepatitis C, which can be extremely expensive and require closer monitoring than other maintenance medications. Specialty pharmacists play an important role in the continuum of care by counseling these patients as well as coordinating the prescription process with the full care team.
Specialty pharmacy refers to distribution channels designed to handle specialty drugs, pharmaceutical therapies that are high cost, high complexity, or “high touch.” High touch prescriptions refer to higher degree of complexity in terms of distribution, administration, or patient management which drives up the cost of the drugs.
St. Elizabeth specialty pharmacy provides the following unique capabilities not offered at retail pharmacies:
- Shared electronic medical record
- Prescriber relationship
- Patient onboarding
- PA/Financial assistance
- Clinical documentation
- Refill maintenance
- Home delivery
- 24-hour support
“Our specialty pharmacy helps streamline beginning to end care and helps control all channels to better ensure patient care and patient experience,” says Bruno Giacomuzzi, Senior Vice President & COO,St. Elizabeth Florence and Grant. “By working diligently to help manage our patients’ disease states, the hope is to decrease morbidity and limitations previously experienced.”
The Medical Village Pharmacy in the Doctor’s Building at 20 Medical Village Drive in Edgewood will continue to provide normal pharmacy operations and individualized medication services that cater to each patient’s unique needs.