Free Preventive Care
A program that enlists pharmacists to get out the word about the closing of the Medicare prescription drug "donut hole" gets Eric thinking about how pharmacists' skills could be put to better use.
Last night I received an email from the American Pharmacists Association that had a link to an article on the APhA website that caught my eye. This morning when I woke up, there were a few links to the same story on my Twitter timeline.
The story... Pharmacies team with HHS to promote free preventive care.
When I initially read the article on my smart phone, I read it as pharmacists providing care for free. That had my blood boiling and I wanted to jump all over the thought of free care. But I slept on it and re-read the article this morning.
The article states that there is growing recognition by HHS of the role that pharmacists play in a patient's health care. Personally I'm don't entirely agree with that, but I'll give that comment a pass.
HHS has, in what is called a pharmacist-friendly move, has partnered with pharmacists to.....
Drum roll
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"...inform Medicare patients about free preventive services and the closing of the Part D coverage gap under the health care reform law."
Pharmacists get to put up posters and pass out fliers on free preventive services for the Medicare population.
WOOHOO!!!
I was hoping to see pharmacists get the opportunity to provide services to the patients (and get reimbursed for said services). But this announcement is underwhelming to say the least.
C'mon APhA. Pharmacists need to be the providers. If we wanted to be the advertising department for HHS, we would have majored in advertising.
