Pharmacies must serve as many patients as possible to generate adequate profits and stay in business. Prescriptions are the primary source of income for many pharmacies along with medical equipment, health and beauty aids, and a limited number of home goods. When streamlining the way the business operates, the business owner must consider what efforts can improve the business and give it more opportunities to get prescriptions filled faster with minimal wait times. By reviewing the 4 key principles of an efficient pharmacy workflow, the owner gets more out of their investments.
1. Controlling the Inventory
When operating a pharmacy, the first step to making it more efficient is to ensure that they control their inventory. Without proper inventory management, the pharmacy could run out of medications that patients rely on to control their medical conditions. The systems should track the inventory and ensure that the pharmacy doesn’t run out of needed medications.
The IT system must present the pharmacy owner with details about the medication and alerts that help them place orders ahead of time to avoid lost sales or manage patients less efficiently. When reviewing their options, the pharmacy owner can learn more about a vertical carousel storage system by contacting a vendor now.
2. Gauging and Organizing How Each Prescription is Filled
The pharmacy mustgauge and organize how each prescription is filled to reduce mistakes that could lead to injuries. The patients will provide information about their prescriptions to the pharmacy tech, and they will enter these details into the system. Once all the details are verified, the system fills the prescription according to the amount and type of medication.
When reviewing how efficient the systems are, the pharmacy owner must evaluate how the prescriptions are managed and ensure that the patients get their prescription when expected, and the medications must be correct.
3. Ensure All Pharmacy Staff Is Trained On New Systems
When implementing any systems into a pharmacy design, the owner and managers must set up training for the entire staff. They must test the workers’ proficiency levels and ensure each worker has mastered all the features of the systems. If they need more training, it is vital to revisit these concepts with the workers to decrease common mistakes that could lead to critical problems for customers or the pharmacy.
4. Use Automated Processes to Increase Speed of Prescription Filling
Automated processes can increase the number of prescriptions filled in a day and could give the pharmacy an opportunity to use a kiosk to manage prescriptions faster. When serving a larger population of patients, the automated system could increase the pharmacy’s earning potential and give the patients their prescription quickly and decrease their waiting time.
For many patients, the waiting time is what encourages them to visit a different pharmacy. They want to be able to get in and out of the pharmacy as quickly as possible and get back to their lives. A pharmacy that has streamlined its processes to decrease waits and serve more customers could expand its profits dramatically.
Pharmacies must operate efficiently to serve patients effectively and generate higher than average profits. Automation and better workflow systems can make incredible differences in how the business operates and give the community everything it needs. Efficient workflow processes give the business owner a streamlined and well-tuned business that performs as expected.