Members of our team had the opportunity to present a new poster abstract at the NASP 2024 Annual Meeting held October 6 – 9.

Congratulations to the CPS specialty pharmacy team for winning National Association of Specialty Pharmacy (NASP)'s Best Poster Award in the Specialty Pharmacy Outcomes and Practice Based Research category for the second consecutive year.

Authors

Trent Towne, PharmD; Ana Lopez-Medina, PharmD, PhD; Lori Lane, BHS, CPhT; Amber Skrtic, PharmD; Carly Giavatto, PharmD; Andrew Wash, PharmD, PhD; Jessica Mourani, PharmD; Tony Zahorian, PharmD; Casey Fitzpatrick; Logan Franke, PharmD​

Background

• The increasing cost of specialty medications has led employers to implement strategies to reduce their overall drug spending, including requiring employees to use Alternative Funding Programs (AFPs) for high-cost mitigations.¹
• AFPs work for vendors to help patients obtain their medication by enrolling them in charitable patient assistance programs, thereby shifting the cost away from the prescription plan. ​
• However, AFPs often fail to meet expectations because patients face numerous obstacles in obtaining their medication.

Objectives

• Compare turnaround times to access medication between patients receiving their specialty therapies from a health-system specialty pharmacy (HSSP) and externally through an AFP.​
• Evaluate the hospitalization rate for patients who received their specialty therapies from HSSP and externally through an AFP.

Read about the team’s findings by downloading the outcomes study below.

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