The pharmacy, a centuries-long institution and stronghold in communities throughout the world, is evolving before our eyes… and screens.
The realities of business today, shifting consumer preferences, competition from market disruptors, and advances in digital technology are just some of the factors forcing a reimagining of the role pharmacies play in our lives, as well as a re-engineering of the models that pharmacies have long relied upon to be profitable.
“To continue to meet growing patient needs, we must evolve how community pharmacy works and, most importantly, how we support our pharmacy teams to create a sustainable future for community pharmacy,” Prem Shah, president of pharmacy and consumer wellness at CVS Health, said, referring the company’s research on consumer expectations and industry challenges.
The future of pharmacy requires sweeping industry changes, digital innovation, and new training. Here are four ways pharmacies can chart a path forward:- Reinvent the brick-and-mortar business model
- Digitize infrastructure for better customer experience
- Incorporate artificial intelligence
- Improve training to support pharmacists
Beyond brick and mortar: The future of pharmacy
Even amid a wave of recent retail store closures and layoffs, research suggests consumers still prefer a face-to-face relationship with their pharmacist, in a brick-and-mortar setting. In the CVS survey, 70% of consumers said they prefer in-person pharmacist interactions. So how do you meet the needs of customers while also meeting bottom line requirements?
Expanding the range of healthcare services offered by pharmacies is a viable pathway forward – it allows them to build upon the trust they’ve forged with consumers over the years.
In a 2023 report from McKinsey based on a survey of 1,000 U.S. consumers, about 40% said they’re interested in accessing common-illness treatment, whole-health fusion, and other services like primary care, dental, lab work, and X-rays via their pharmacy. Vision care, nurses, physical therapists, physician’s assistants, and even MDs could be part of the package.
Essentially, future pharmacies could serve as a local healthcare hub where patients get personalized and high-touch services.
Competing with giants while serving the people: Pharmacies win by providing irreplaceable experiences
As newcomers like Mark Cuban Cost Plus Drug Company enter the prescription drug business in an effort to lower costs and boost consumer convenience, pharmacies can differentiate themselves by creating a customer experience that’s truly personalized – where professionals go beyond the realm of corporate jargon into the reality of providing what customers want.
Online prescription tracking, home delivery and ordering, scheduling, making payments, etc., through an app – these are all must-haves to be competitive in the future. Pharmacies could also help customers financially by providing a prescription drug pricing tool similar to Optum Rx Price Edge, which assists in finding the best prices for a given drug.
Offering a telemedicine option could also improve CX, giving customers a holistic experience that augments the face-to-face interactions they value.
CVS found that up to 90% of Americans believe that a connected, digital pharmacy experience enhances the overall patient experience.
To provide those coveted and connected experiences, a sophisticated digital infrastructure is needed on the back end – but it doesn’t stop there. Pharmacies can’t forget the reason they’re in business: intuitive consumer-facing digital tools help customers navigate the complexities of healthcare today, and can be a priceless differentiator when it comes down to where consumers spend their money.
Each party providing care to patients must have ready access to a single source of truth about each aspect of the patient’s journey so they’re fully informed and prepared to meet the patient’s needs. The future pharmacy ecosystem must be digitally connected with systems that enable providers to securely and compliantly (a major consideration with HIPAA) access and share patient data about medications, treatments, pricing and more.
All this requires:- broadly accepted standards and policies governing front- and back-end systems and processes
- the handling of electronic medical records, secure data management and exchange, and communications
- interoperability among systems and data
The goal is to create a digital thread that connects every aspect of patient care, and a seamless experience for the patient.
Enterprise, meet your customer.
Interactions, data, front and back office – connected.
It starts here.
AI and the future of pharmacy: The RX for smarter care
As with other industries, we’re only scratching the surface of what artificial intelligence can do in a pharmacy setting.
Generative AI copilots can support pharmacists by predicting certain elevated risks for patients, diagnosing issues, recommending medications and treatments, and providing prompts to care providers during visits.
AI also can help pharmacies manage compliance responsibilities—and the data required to meet them. Intelligent capabilities can even predict the likelihood an individual will become non-adherent to their medication.
Training the pharmacists of the future
Deloitte envisions a future where pharmacists could be “the next generation of primary care providers… who treat patients with acute illnesses and manage chronic conditions like diabetes, hypertension, and asthma.”
Findings from a 2024 report suggest pharmacists are ready to embrace a larger role in patient care. The report found that 75% of pharmacists said they should be allowed to take on more primary care duties.
Getting there will require not just regulatory changes, but more robust training. It’s vital that pharmacists have easy access to education and certification resources so they can acquire the know-how to provide these services, and on the flip-side, customers need to be able to easily verify pharmacist credentials.
Because ultimately, for pharmacies to evolve and meet the shifting needs of today’s consumers, pharmacists will need to evolve, too.
