What will the impact of Amazon Pharmacy be?

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What will the impact of Amazon Pharmacy be?

Post by SamSpade »

I'm seeing Instagram ads for Amazon Pharmacy now. Looks like they have a patented pill bottle shape (sadly not the Target revolution ones coming back).
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Re: What will the impact of Amazon Pharmacy be?

Post by storewanderer »

I've been seeing these ads too, but I am starting to wonder if more customers are having a negative perception of Amazon for one reason or another (Amazon Fresh and the negative perception most people are having of it, really leaves me with concerns).
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Re: What will the impact of Amazon Pharmacy be?

Post by veteran+ »

Originally PillPack?

They recently bought One Medical as well.
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Re: What will the impact of Amazon Pharmacy be?

Post by SamSpade »

veteran+ wrote: October 11th, 2022, 5:30 am Originally PillPack?

They recently bought One Medical as well.
Oh right. I forgot they bought into this marketplace. :)
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Re: What will the impact of Amazon Pharmacy be?

Post by ClownLoach »

They definitely are focusing on promoting this business more lately. Seeing the same dramatic increase in Instagram and Facebook ads. In the Amazon app they are promoting their pharmacy as well, even have a little "flyover bubble" that appears in the menu. Seems like they are focused on customers without insurance, or customers with poor coverage as the ads illustrate cost savings instead of convenience/technology/etc. which are what you would expect to see from Amazon.

It has been quite a while since they bought Pillpack, so maybe they've decided that they have succeeded in integrating the company and feel comfortable with their offering enough to advertise? If there is one business that has to operate flawlessly it is pharmacy - make one mistake that gets someone sick or worse and everyone will hear about it.

I know there are more pharmacy experts on here that can explain the subject better than me, but it seems that centralized pharmacies are becoming more common (where the order is fulfilled at a central warehouse facility and the pill bottle is sent back to the local pharmacy). Costco is doing this in my area; I go to pick up my aunt's prescriptions there and many are fulfilled offsite. The offsite ones are on the rack in a sealed, bar code labeled clear plastic bag with pill bottle and paperwork inside while the onsite ones are in a paper bag stapled. The pharmacy tech dispensing opens the plastic bag at the counter, scans the pill bottle on the register and then places bottle and paperwork in a paper bag, throwing away the plastic bag from the central pharmacy. So basically nobody onsite at the store is examining these to ensure that they are correct pills, etc. because they physically remain sealed from the central pharmacy facility until the second they're given to the customer.

Point being that many consumers may fear the idea of having a offsite pharmacy fill their prescriptions - but as they realize that the smiling pharmacist at their local store never touches their pills and they are being ordered/packaged offsite anyway they may become more comfortable with the idea of using a service like Amazon if there is a cost savings for them.
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Re: What will the impact of Amazon Pharmacy be?

Post by BillyGr »

ClownLoach wrote: October 11th, 2022, 10:19 am I know there are more pharmacy experts on here that can explain the subject better than me, but it seems that centralized pharmacies are becoming more common (where the order is fulfilled at a central warehouse facility and the pill bottle is sent back to the local pharmacy). Costco is doing this in my area; I go to pick up my aunt's prescriptions there and many are fulfilled offsite. The offsite ones are on the rack in a sealed, bar code labeled clear plastic bag with pill bottle and paperwork inside while the onsite ones are in a paper bag stapled. The pharmacy tech dispensing opens the plastic bag at the counter, scans the pill bottle on the register and then places bottle and paperwork in a paper bag, throwing away the plastic bag from the central pharmacy. So basically nobody onsite at the store is examining these to ensure that they are correct pills, etc. because they physically remain sealed from the central pharmacy facility until the second they're given to the customer.

Point being that many consumers may fear the idea of having a offsite pharmacy fill their prescriptions - but as they realize that the smiling pharmacist at their local store never touches their pills and they are being ordered/packaged offsite anyway they may become more comfortable with the idea of using a service like Amazon if there is a cost savings for them.
That should work OK for "regular" medicines but would be an issue when something is prescribed and you need to take it today, as there is no way to get it from a central location to the store immediately (or to get it from a mail or similar type service).
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Re: What will the impact of Amazon Pharmacy be?

Post by ClownLoach »

BillyGr wrote: October 11th, 2022, 1:57 pm
ClownLoach wrote: October 11th, 2022, 10:19 am I know there are more pharmacy experts on here that can explain the subject better than me, but it seems that centralized pharmacies are becoming more common (where the order is fulfilled at a central warehouse facility and the pill bottle is sent back to the local pharmacy). Costco is doing this in my area; I go to pick up my aunt's prescriptions there and many are fulfilled offsite. The offsite ones are on the rack in a sealed, bar code labeled clear plastic bag with pill bottle and paperwork inside while the onsite ones are in a paper bag stapled. The pharmacy tech dispensing opens the plastic bag at the counter, scans the pill bottle on the register and then places bottle and paperwork in a paper bag, throwing away the plastic bag from the central pharmacy. So basically nobody onsite at the store is examining these to ensure that they are correct pills, etc. because they physically remain sealed from the central pharmacy facility until the second they're given to the customer.

Point being that many consumers may fear the idea of having a offsite pharmacy fill their prescriptions - but as they realize that the smiling pharmacist at their local store never touches their pills and they are being ordered/packaged offsite anyway they may become more comfortable with the idea of using a service like Amazon if there is a cost savings for them.
That should work OK for "regular" medicines but would be an issue when something is prescribed and you need to take it today, as there is no way to get it from a central location to the store immediately (or to get it from a mail or similar type service).
What I'm not sure about with this recent change at Costco is if they are not stocking these drugs at all in the store pharmacy, or if they are just fulfilling refills at the central facility to reduce workload in the store and save labor? If they know that you're coming in every 30 days for your same prescription then they can just send it to the off site facility automatically. However my understanding is that there are many of these regular maintenance type drugs that are only being ordered in from the central location, even insulin. All of the Costco stores I've visited recently in SoCal have added a red sign in the pharmacy register area stating something like "This Costco Pharmacy uses a centralized offsite pharmacy to fulfill prescriptions"
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Re: What will the impact of Amazon Pharmacy be?

Post by HCal »

I understand that Costco has a pharmacy fulfillment facility in Corona. This is within a short drive of dozens of Costco pharmacies. They could easily fill prescriptions there and have them delivered to the stores within a day. Many customers would probably never even know, because they would still see a technician (and possibly a pharmacist if they have any questions) when picking it up. That is a huge difference from an anonymous mail order pharmacy.
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Re: What will the impact of Amazon Pharmacy be?

Post by Alpha8472 »

Cost of is doing this to reduce costs. The big way to save money is keep as few drugs as possible on the shelves at the Costco Pharmacy in the store. Costco pharmacies are much smaller than a CVS pharmacy. The Costco Pharmacy has few drugs on its shelves. If you need a drug right away, many times the Costco Pharmacy will be out of stock.

Keeping expensive drugs on the shelves is frowned upon. Costco is all about cutting costs and saving every penny. You might as well wait the extra time for the central fill to fill the drug and have it delivered to the store.

The problem with central fill machines is cross contamination. These automated filling machines have all of the different drugs passing through the same tube into a bottle. If you are allergic to a drug you could be exposed to many different drug residues and have an allergic reaction.

No person is going to clean those tubes after every drug.

A machine fills abortion pills and then it spits out prenatal vitamins. Good luck with that.

At retail pharmacies the workers constantly clean their counting trays and counting tools. The workers are educated to keep abortion drugs separated from other drugs and to clean after the abortion drugs.

Cancer drugs are highly toxic. These can kill living tissue and can cause birth defects. Workers must wear gloves and clean the trays with approved decontamination liquids.

Cancer drugs can damage healthy cells and cause cancer themselves in healthy people. Chemotherapy is all about killing cells. Even healthy cells can be killed by these drugs.

I doubt that a central fill pharmacy will be so caring as to go and clean the automated machine's tubes after each cancer drug. They do not have the time or staff to clean these huge filling machines.

This is why these high volume bulk pharmacies are dangerous.

People wonder why they just randomly suffer strange allergic reactions, random miscarriages, failed pregnancies, random cancers, etc.

What if the machine fills female hormones and the next patient is a man. There is going to be contamination.

CVS is a chain where they have automated filling machines in the retail store. When I worked there the machine spit out all the different medications through one tube into pill bottles. There was so much contamination. All the drugs were leaving residue in the single exit tube. It was scary. Someone is going to have an allergic reaction one of these days. If you die, good luck trying to sue. Maybe your relatives will receive a settlement.

Some pharmacy chains such as Walmart have policies where every single dangerous drug is listed as hazardous. The computer reminds the filling person to clean the tray and instruments each time. Walmart does not use automated filling machines in their store pharmacies and is very strict on preventing cross contamination. This program ensures safety.
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