Today I went on a road trip to Council, a small town just over 120 miles away from Boise, with one of the state pharmacy inspectors. We went to check out a small pilot project pharmacy that utilizes a remote dispensing machine (RDM) to help deliver pharmacy services to this small rural area.
This pharmacy is only manned by one pharmacy tech. She receives prescriptions and faxes them to a pharmacy in Weiser (a little over 50 miles away). There a pharmacist reviews the prescription and activates the program to allow the machine to dispense the medication. The RDM contains medications already to go in prescription bottles. The bottle drops out in the bottom of the machine (just like a candy vending machine). The tech then adds a patient-specific label to the bottle and contacts the pharmacist on a videophone to verify that the correct medication is dispensed by the machine. Patients are also able to receive counseling on the videophone as well.
In case a doctor prescribes something not stocked in the machine, the pharmacy in Weiser fills the prescription there and delivers it to the pharmacy in Council.
It's a little nuts to think about, but it makes it a little bit more convenient to patients who live there. If this program works, RDMs could pop up in other small towns in Idaho that also don't have a pharmacist.
1 comment:
That is really interesting. All the ways technology is changing our lives. Thanks for stopping by on my blog. I didn't know that you were blogging.
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