Specialty pharmacy turnaround time impediments, facilitators, and good practices

Area of Science:

• Pharmacy Practice
• Health Services Research
• Medication Management

Background:

• Specialty medications are crucial for complex, high-cost, high-need conditions.
• Prompt initiation of specialty medications is vital for optimal patient health outcomes.
• Improving specialty pharmacy prescription turnaround time (TAT) is essential but under-researched.

Purpose of the Study:

• To identify factors influencing specialty pharmacy TAT.
• To discover best practices for improving TAT in specialty pharmacies.

Main Methods:

• Qualitative study utilizing 4 focus groups with specialty pharmacy experts.
• Participants represented diverse specialty pharmacy types: health system, payer-associated, retail chain, and independent.
• Thematic analysis of data captured attitudes, beliefs, experiences, impediments, facilitators, and good practices related to TAT.

Main Results:

• Fifteen experts participated, revealing TAT variations by pharmacy type and prescription complexity.
• Key influencing factors included formulary management, prior authorization delays, payer requirements, and physician communication.
• Facilitators and good practices identified: technology integration, disease specialization, patient financial advocates, and structured onboarding.

Conclusions:

• Numerous factors impact specialty pharmacy prescription TAT.
• Multidisciplinary collaboration among pharmacies, physicians, and managed care organizations is critical.
• Optimizing TAT ensures timely medication access for improved patient health outcomes.