Simpler infusion pharmacy management starts with these 4 things

The infusion pharmacy workflow demands a lot from pharmacists. There are a number of pharmacy management systems in the market today, so knowing which is right for your organization can be tricky.

Infusion pharmacy management systems aren’t one size fits all. For a software solution to benefit your organization the most, it should simplify and streamline the entire process and eliminate manual tasks, from referral receipt to delivery. It should easily scale for the size and volume of your organization and be customizable to support your internal workflows.

Home infusion presents even more unique challenges because caregivers need expertise in pharmacy, nursing, and home healthcare. They need access to the same technology and information available in a healthcare setting, but in the home environment.

One-stop shop convenience for infusion pharmacy management

One of the most frustrating and time-consuming shortfalls for some infusion pharmacy systems is the piecemeal approach to data aggregation. If staff are forced to access disparate systems to gather patient data, the workflow slows down and patients experience delays to treatment.

The best care is informed care. Pharmacists, nurses, and other caregivers need a complete picture of a patient’s medical history to provide the best treatment plans and therapies. This includes patient-provided information as well as EHR data about previous diagnoses, other medications, allergies, lab results, and more.

Infusion pharmacy management systems should provide comprehensive patient data upfront and within a single system. That way, regardless of who is providing care, or where they’re located, they have a single source of truth.

Persona-based infusion pharmacy workflow

While it’s efficient to have an end-to-end infusion pharmacy workflow in a single system, processing a single patient prescription requires several steps and encompasses many different functions. This is where a persona-based workflow shines.

Persona-based workflows automatically initiate tasks for the right users at just the right time. Inovalon’s ScriptMed^® Infusion software only shows users their individual tasks, eliminating the need to navigate through the entire system.

“At the intake step for a patient we have workflows configured in ScriptMed that are queuing all the various requirements that come from multiple directions for correct patient management and meeting payer requirements.”

Chris Antypas, President
Perigon Specialty Pharmacy

Cloud-native infusion pharmacy infrastructure

A crucial function for infusion pharmacies is seamless communication with referral partners. To be a preferred partner, infusion pharmacies must make the intake process easy and efficient, which means having the technology to support electronic data exchange. Secure, cloud-based FHIR^®-enabled patient data allows for real-time data sharing, eliminates manual reporting, and enables easy submission to accreditation bodies.

Automation to accelerate the infusion pharmacy process

In addition to streamlining repetitive or time-consuming tasks, infusion pharmacy management automation must be nimble enough to prioritize work as new orders come in, balancing it with current processing demands.

When changes to an order occur, they should be implemented immediately and communicated to all stakeholders without requiring the pharmacist to update spreadsheets or send urgent emails.

Scheduling and logistics should also be managed automatically to ensure timeliness of medication deliveries and nurse scheduling at the site of care to administer the therapy.

Trust your infusion pharmacy management to Inovalon

ScriptMed is trusted to serve approximately 30% of specialty patients nationally¹ for good reason. Our pharmacy cloud solutions are dedicated to driving operational efficiencies, lower costs, and the best possible patient outcomes.

ScriptMed is a one-stop shop for top-to-bottom infusion pharmacy management, from faster intake and eligibility processing to templating of custom drug formulas, compounding instructions, complex calculations, and automated degradation of inventory.

Discover how to harness the power of one solution for all your pharmacy workflow needs.

Source:

1. Inovalon internal reporting, ScriptMed, 2022