Here at PDS, we take pride in highlighting some of our incredible solutions partners. We know these companies have the potential to revolutionize pharmacies just like yours through their products and services. We’re excited to introduce RxSafe; read on for their sponsored blog post about a new approach towards inventory management.

Inventory is typically the largest asset in a pharmacy. Bottles on the shelf and vials in the refrigerator represent real money, cash just sitting there. For that reason, keeping inventory at an optimal level—not too much, not too little—is one of the best ways to ensure that your investment is being managed in the most efficient manner. If you can reduce your inventory without affecting customer service, it can free up cash that can be used for other money generating activities.

Reaching the Benchmark

One measure of a pharmacy’s inventory efficiency is to track how often the business ‘turns’ its inventory. According to America’s Pharmacist, May 2016, twelve inventory turns per year is often the benchmark for a well-run pharmacy. Inventory turns can be calculated by dividing the total annual cost of goods by average inventory value. But, capturing a current, accurate snapshot of this information is a moving target due to constant price changes and the need for frequent cycle counting which is tedious and often neglected.

Consider the case of Paw Paw Pharmacy in Paw Paw, Michigan. In 2016 they had a $50,000 decrease in inventory levels which totaled $80,000 in savings and their inventory turns increased by 6+ turns per year. What happened? Perpetual inventory management with accurate, automatic cycle counting—made possible by installing an RxSafe 1800.

Imagine This

Imagine a future where, on a daily basis, you could capture cost information for every NDC in your pharmacy, and track it to each bottle. On top of that, you could have item-level forecasting and item-level tracking, including historical cost data available on demand, 24/7. How much could you reduce your on-hand inventory, improving inventory turns and free up excess cash without the burden of frequent cycle counting? Wouldn’t that be a level of inventory management unheard of in the industry?

Welcome to the World of RxCloud Analytics

The latest innovation in RxSafe’s line of pharmacy automation technology is RxCloud Analytics™. Powered by Datarithm, it provides pharmacy owners using the RxSafe 1800 system with 24/7 cloud-based analytics. With RxCloud Analytics, your pharmacy can spend time and money on something other than inventory management.

This type of item-level cost tracking provides extremely accurate cost of inventory, as well as granularity about inventory valuation, which has never been possible before. Some RxSafe customers are already taking advantage of the data made available by the RxSafe/Datarithm partnership.

At Chris’ Pharmacy and Gifts, an independent pharmacy in Maruepas, La., owner Chris Williams, RPh, says, “RxSafe’s solution has been very valuable, especially for multiple stores. The program’s non-usage report will effectively indicate what medications we should send to our other locations or what medications to return to the wholesaler — as opposed to letting the medications sit on the shelf just waiting to expire.”

“When we began this partnership, our goal was to combine Datarithm’s sophisticated inventory modeling with RxSafe’s proven automated perpetual inventory accuracy, to eliminate cycle-counting, free up cash, and allow pharmacies to focus on their core business,” said William Holmes, President & CEO at RxSafe. “With RxCloud Analytics, we’ve done just that. What’s more, the combination of these two technologies has created a game-changing model that improves service delivery and profitability in pharmacy.”

RxCloud Analytics is available exclusively to customers that have qualifying pharmacy management systems. Currently, that includes ComputerRx, PioneerRx, and Rx30, and will soon include Liberty.

RxCloud Analytics is included with the purchase of an RxSafe 1800. We will be happy to set up an in-person or online demonstration of the RxSafe 1800. You can also check out the details here for more information and to view video testimonials from independent pharmacy owners currently using the RxSafe 1800 in their retail stores.

About the Author:

RxSafe is the leader in automated, high-density robotic storage and retrieval technologies for independent pharmacies. Our flagship RxSafe system enables pharmacies to take control of their inventory management, enhance patient safety, increase narcotics security, and improve profitability. RxSafe’s RapidPakRx adherence packaging technology enables pharmacies to custom package patient medications on demand. RapidPakRx produces multi-med pouches with unprecedented throughput, accuracy, and efficiency, as well as the lowest consumables cost in the industry. For more information, visit www.rxsafe.com. To stay connected, follow RxSafe on Twitter, LinkedIn, and Facebook.

Here at PDS, we take pride in highlighting some of our incredible solutions partners. We know these companies have the potential to revolutionize pharmacies just like yours through their products and services. We’re excited to introduce LP3 Network; read on for their sponsored blog post about the benefits of blended learning in your pharmacy.

At some point in our educational careers, we have all found ourselves thinking:

• Is this really the most exciting way to learn something new?
• Is this an efficient way to learn?

With advances in instructional design and the implementation of blended learning concepts, continuing professional development is being reshaped and revitalized, allowing people to obtain the training they require in an exciting and stimulating manner.

What is Blended Learning?

Blended learning is a newly successful practice that involves a hybrid of traditional and practical methodology.

The world of compounding encompasses both new and experienced pharmacists/technicians, all of whom need initial and ongoing training to safely compound personalized medications for their patients. Unfortunately, the specialized knowledge required to compound is not taught in most pharmacy programs. For those who wish to learn more about pharmacy compounding, there are now solutions available that do not require tedious and uninvolved classroom-like courses.

The most engaging and effective way to learn is through hands-on experience. Especially in a profession like pharmaceutical compounding, the skills needed to create quality preparations are most readily obtained through real-life observations and demonstrations. In laboratory trainings, participants get the chance to prepare different dosage forms and work with innovative equipment in a compliant environment.  Laboratory trainings are undoubtedly valuable; however, subject knowledge on the matter is vital as a prerequisite.

The optimal form of training is a combination of theoretical and practical methods — blending the two.

Using self-paced learning with an interactive live course, success and retention are optimized. Providing both the background knowledge and hands-on experience enables participants to successfully compound in their own pharmacy. This unique form of blended learning ensures that participants are fully briefed with the specific knowledge required prior to hands-on activities in a lab.

This hybrid teaching method is undoubtedly the ideal way to learn best practices and enhance competency retention, as it allows participants to absorb the material at their own pace through home studying, followed by training with subject-matter experts in a state-of-the-art compounding laboratory.

Next time you’re in the market to truly train your team or yourself on invaluable strategies that will grow your pharmacy, look out for ways to make learning fun and practical. You will not regret it! The ability to incorporate the wisdom gained through live event courses into a pharmacist’s everyday practice is invaluable. But more importantly, a hybrid learning experience brings excitement back into the curious minds of pharmacists.

About the Author:

To learn more about LP3 Network’s course offerings contact us by email: info@lp3network.com or view our online course catalogue: https://education.lp3network.com/

At LP3 Network, the educational process is reinvented in engaging ways. With a vast spectrum of courses to choose from, participants can learn all the things they need to lead a successful compounding career. The style of courses vary to suit every person’s individual needs from:

• Home studies
• Webinars
• eLearning
• Live events (seminars and laboratory trainings)

Our courses allow pharmacists and pharmacy technicians  to reinforce their theoretical knowledge and provide compounding pharmacists with concrete training that they can use in their everyday profession. This blended approach allows participants to choose when and where they want to learn more about compounding. With busy agendas, it is often difficult for participants to follow a rigorous course schedule. There are now many options for participants, affording them the opportunity to study at their own pace, and choose the learning methods that suit them best.

If you’re like many of the 20,000+ independent pharmacy owners in the nation, you went to the business school of life… which means that you didn’t go to business school at all. You rely on different sources from networking to online literature (like this blog!), business coaching and everything in between.

Fear not, weary warrior. We’re here to bring you a powerful, yet simple tool you can use with your team to uncover the next big opportunity your pharmacy can leverage.

We’re talking about a SWOT Analysis. If you have heard of this, you know that this is a simple, yet powerful tool. When used thoroughly and thoughtfully, it can help identify your business’ strengths and weaknesses as well as any opportunities and threats that lie in wait to stall your growth. SWOT is an acronym for Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats. As far as general business strategy, this handy little tool can be a starting point to open up major team discussions.

You guessed it, we have the worksheet you can download right here!

>> Download the PDS SWOT Analysis here <<

Make sure you download and print the file first, then read below with your team to learn how to use the matrix.

Conducting a SWOT Analysis on Your Business
(Do this with your team!)

Do you have your worksheet ready and printed out? Good!

A SWOT matrix is normally a worksheet divided into four quadrants. Each quadrant represents one element of the SWOT analysis: Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats. Each quadrant should ask a series of custom questions you can answer to fill in that quadrant. Focus on the questions that are most relevant for your business, community and current situation.

Dig Deep and Ask Relevant Questions

Strengths:

For this section, think about the attributes of yourself, your team and your business that will helpyou achieve your objective. Sample questions to get you started:

• Where are you most profitable in your business?
• What do you do exceptionally well?
• What skills do you have that are unique to you, your team and your location?
• What are your specialties?
• What do you do better than your competitors?

Weaknesses:

For this section, think about the attributes of yourself, your team and your business that could hurtyour progress in achieving your objective. Sample questions to get you started:

• What areas do you need to improvement?
• What areas do you need more education or experience?
• What parts of your business are not very profitable?
• Do you lack any resources?
• What are the initiatives that cost you time and/or money?

Opportunities:

For this section, think about the external conditions that will help you achieve your objective. Sample questions to get you started:

• What are your current business goals?
• Are there untapped target audiences you can reach?
• How can you improve your current customer experience or customer wellness?
• Is there technology that you can apply to improve your business?
• Can you think of any supplemental products and services that provide an opportunity for your business?

Threats:

For this section, think about the external conditions that could damage your business’s performance. Sample questions to get you started:

• What are your obstacles?
• What is going on in the economy that can potentially affect your business?
• What is going on in the industry that can potentially affect your business?
• What are the strengths of your biggest competitors?
• What are your competitors doing that you’re not?

You’ve Filled it Out! Now What?

This worksheet won’t help you unless you can analyze the data you’ve compiled and put it into action. While going through, you may have already identified some strategies and goals for your business. Your next steps should be:

• Create a plan to expand on the strengths you’ve identified
• Identify ways you can diminish, dispell or defer your weaknesses
• Set achievable goals for each of the opportunities you have identified
• Use your strengths to decrease the threats you identified

Mix It Up.

Now the opportunities should start flying off the page. Explore ways in which you can combine your strengths and opportunities to develop new strategies. Try combining strengths and threats to identify threats you can eliminate and look at your weaknesses and opportunities to create a list of areas ready for improvement.

You should also make a list of areas to avoid that fall under weaknesses and threats. Once you can read your data and understand the recordings, you can find ways to use it strategically. The best part is that you can use this tool over and over again to explore new opportunities, uncover lurking threats, and improve your business year after year.

>> Download your SWOT file here <<

Join us at the  PDS Super-Conference

If you’re ready to accelerate your success, profitability, and team, now is your chance to act. Come see for yourself why we are so confident in our ability to change your life and improve the profitability of your pharmacy that we have a conference guarantee. If you don’t see the value of the PDS Super-Conference after the first day, we’ll reimburse your travel up to $500 and give you an additional $300 — no questions asked.