Pharmacy management systems streamline the operational processes of pharmacies to improve customer experiences. They integrate with health insurance providers to speed up reimbursement processes and facilitate accurate audit documentation.
They also manage drug inventory using previous transaction records to make data-driven decisions. This helps eliminate errors and makes data retrieval faster.
Automated Prescription Dispensing
Running a pharmacy business is complex and time-consuming. With growing consumer expectations for quick, on-demand access to healthcare providers, pharmacies are challenged with meeting their customers’ needs while adhering to strict regulations and driving profitability.
A robust pharmacy management system (PMS) will streamline and automate your most time-consuming tasks so that you can focus more on your customers. Good software for pharmacy management will also offer additional capabilities to help your business grow.
For example, one hospital pharmacy we worked with reduced their backroom drug inventory reordering time from two weeks to 30 minutes. This automated solution redirected 11 staff members from picking and packing drugs to front dispensing, allowing them to serve 50% more patients.
This technology will also help you automate your 340B drug pricing program and improve your track and trace capability to reduce costs and waste caused by stock mismanagement. It will even help you identify opportunities to increase profits with a customizable order point calculator.
Another important feature is the ability to monitor inventory across all store locations. A fully integrated POS and multi-store feature will give you the flexibility to deliver a consistent customer experience. This functionality will also make it easier to monitor failed pick-ups and redistribute or resell those items, reducing the number of medications left in your call bin. It will also empower you to automatically send alerts and cycle counts to your team based on workflow.
Medication Reminders
A pharmacy management system can help with medication adherence monitoring and reminders. These can be through texts, e-mails or phone calls to patients. This feature can help pharmacies to streamline workflows, increase patient satisfaction and reduce the number of medications that need to be taken properly. It also encourages a more efficient way of handling orders and managing inventories.
Medication synchronization software allows pharmacies to align multiple prescription refill dates for each patient in one go. It also alerts the pharmacist when a new prescription is ready for pick up and helps to reduce the number of missed appointments by patients.
Other features include a centralized data backup system that eliminates technical errors while providing easy access to vital information in an emergency. It also ensures that business operations continue smoothly without interruption. It can help improve sales and revenue reporting and detect suspicious activity.
A good pharmacy software must be customizable and able to provide the specific functionality that each pharmacy needs. This includes modules for inventory tracking, claims processing, 340b compliance and more. In addition, it should have integrated billing solutions to save time and money, as well as document management capabilities to manage Certificates of Medical Necessity forms, insurance cards, medical records, prescriptions and workers’ compensation documents.
Electronic Prescriptions
Managing inventory is one of the greatest challenges faced by pharmacies. Paper-based inventory management is time-consuming, labor-intensive and susceptible to errors that can be costly. Pharmacy management software, on the other hand, automates inventory processes and reduces manual efforts to mitigate high workloads and improve performance.
A good PMS system should have a centralized database that is easy to access. It also simplifies data entry and enables data analysis to facilitate informed decisions. It also helps to eliminate redundancies and boost productivity.
In addition to enhancing efficiency, an ideal pharmacy management solution should enable pharmacists to spend more time on value-added activities such as education and patient counseling. The system should have a patient communication module to inform customers about delivery status and medication refill reminders.
Moreover, an effective pharmacy management system should provide an electronic prescription service (e-prescribe) to expedite filling, renewing, modifying or canceling a prescription. The e-prescribe feature eliminates the need for written prescriptions and increases safety and convenience by eliminating the chance of human error. Lastly, the system should have a document management tool that allows for the scanning, storing and retrieving of medical documents, including Certificates of Medical Necessity forms, insurance cards, prescriptions and workers’ compensation forms. Streamlining these processes is essential to reducing operational costs and ensuring patient satisfaction.
Inventory Management
The pharmacy industry demands strict adherence to complex regulations while fostering profitability. Pharmacies use specialized software solutions to streamline and automate processes and improve operational efficiency. Pharmacy management systems are similar to the point of sale (POS) and sales recording tools but with more features specific to the pharmaceutical business.
The best pharmacy management systems enable drugstores to manage inventory and fill prescriptions while increasing customer satisfaction easily. Integrated with the pharmacy’s point of sale, these software solutions streamline inbound and outbound processing by eliminating manual steps, saving time and improving accuracy. They also provide real-time information on sales, profit margins, and inventory levels, as well as report on trends and performance.
Dedicated pharmacy software offers many additional features that support pharmacy operations and improve patient engagement, including automated refills, e-prescribing, and drug interaction monitoring. It can also help schedule staff, enabling the pharmacy to be properly staffed. It can even include an Interactive Voice Response system that can handle call volumes during peak times, allowing pharmacists to focus on assisting patients.
Other key pharmacy management software features include a compounding tool, an advanced bin management feature, and customizable prescription labels. This software can also track expiry dates and automatically alert pharmacists when immediate restocking is required. These features make the workflow more efficient, reduce error rates, and improve adherence to medication regimens.
