Marketing Two Immunization Services at a Regional Supermarket Chain Pharmacy

Area of Science:

• Pharmacy Practice
• Public Health Interventions
• Vaccination Services

Background:

• Personal selling involves patient dialogue to identify and address vaccination needs.
• Integrating personal selling into pharmacy workflows can promote vaccine uptake.
• Previous efforts focused on specific vaccines like pneumococcal polysaccharide vaccine (PPSV23) and herpes zoster vaccine (ZVL).

Purpose of the Study:

• To integrate personal selling into the dispensing workflow for promoting PPSV23.
• To evaluate the impact of personal selling and automated telephone calls on ZVL promotion.

Main Methods:

• A pilot project integrated personal selling for PPSV23 in one supermarket pharmacy.
• A full study in 19 pharmacies compared personal selling and automated calls for ZVL promotion.
• Mann-Whitney U tests analyzed vaccine delivery rates between study and control groups.

Main Results:

• The PPSV23 pilot project identified eligible patients but resulted in no vaccinations.
• In the ZVL study, personal selling and automated calls led to higher vaccine delivery rates (15.5% in the study group).
• The study group showed significantly higher vaccine delivery rates than the control group (p < 0.05).

Conclusions:

• Personal selling integration into pharmacy workflows offers valuable insights, even if initial vaccination rates are low.
• Personal selling, alone or combined with automated calls, effectively increases vaccine delivery rates.
• Pharmacy-based interventions are crucial for improving immunization coverage.