Pharmacy workflow is the sequence of steps, from start to finish, required to complete a task, like filling a prescription for a customer. Well-organized and well-designed workflows increase productivity while ensuring high-quality care and customer service to people coming into your retail pharmacy for their prescriptions.
Too often, retail pharmacies are understaffed and too busy to introduce other services, like vaccine clinics and medication therapy management. Increasing productivity by improving pharmacy workflow can allow pharmacies to introduce different ways to serve the patients in their community.
If you’re wondering how to improve pharmacy workflow, here are three tips that can help.
1. Evaluate How Things Get Done
Before you can optimize workflow, you must evaluate how things currently get done. Write down the steps from when a doctor calls in a prescription to when the customer picks it up. How many are there? How many people does it take? Are there any bottlenecks?
Look at the physical flow of the task. Does the tech need to walk from one side of the pharmacy to the other? Is anyone standing around waiting? How long do customers have to wait?
After you figure out what areas need improvement, set measurable goals; for example, you can aim to have every prescription filled within 20 minutes of the doctor calling in the prescription. Analyze the process and see if you can make any noticeable improvements.
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