CEO Message June 6, 2008
Author: Lynn Rolston
Dear Member,
Ten Percent Medi-Cal Budget Cuts Update
As I mentioned last week, our efforts are working to inform lawmakers and the public about the impending disaster to come should these cuts be implemented on July 1, 2008. There was another flurry of news articles this week related to the Legislature’s activities. See articles below where Assembly Speaker Karen Bass has pledged to come up with $6.4 billion in additional revenues and savings to avoid funding cuts to health, education and social service programs. Other lawmakers have expressed extreme concern regarding these cuts as well. We will keep you regularly updated on any movement within the Legislature regarding provider cuts.
We have made significant progress on the legal front and will have a big announcement early next week. Stay tuned…
On Wednesday, June 11, we will be holding a news conference at the Capitol where we will highlight the extreme hardship that these cuts will have on patients who are unable to get their medications due to pharmacies turning away Medi-Cal beneficiaries or because they are forced to close their doors altogether. In addition, we will display the more than 22,000 signatures we have gathered so far to stop cuts, and students from the UOP School of Pharmacy will be in attendance to deliver the more than 1,000 opposition letters they have collected.
Partner Activities
Mike Quick from AmerisourceBergen, let me know this week that they are sending out the following package to more than 500 pharmacies in California. The package will include a letter explaining to them the grassroots campaign to fight the budget cuts, a display unit for petition cards and 200 petition cards (bilingual – front English, back Spanish) with a letter encouraging pharmacists to urge their customers to sign the petition and fax it to the number included on the information sheet. In addition, Good Neighbor Pharmacy is running ads on Univision radio and other southern California media partners.
It is efforts like these that will help to make the difference in our success with stopping the cuts. Thank you AmerisourceBergen!
Compounding Regulation Update
As many of you know, the Board of Pharmacy formed a task force and started having meetings on compounding in 2004. In 2007, the Board commenced publication of a draft regulation for compounding pharmacies. The language has been modified in response to comment since this time and the board believes the regulation language is nearly finalized. The Board of Pharmacy is required to release the regulation language for 45 days of public comment before it can act to adopt or further modify the language. The compounding regulation was initially supposed to be taken up at the July board meeting but the review process outside the Board could not be completed in time. As such, the Board of Pharmacy will take up the regulation for a vote at the October 2008 public meeting. Expect to see the revised regulation released for the 45-day public comment period sometime during this summer.
Exciting Changes at the Pharmacy Foundation
The Pharmacy Foundation of California (PFC) was created by CPhA more than 30 years ago to "improve and protect public health through the performance of pharmacy-related education, research and information dissemination.” For more than 30 years, PFC has pursued this purpose mainly by providing educational programs and best practice information to pharmacists throughout the state.
In 2006, PFC became more involved in the area of public policy as it assumed the role of administrator for the California Medication Errors Panel. In this capacity, the Foundation helped to create and release the Panel’s report on medication errors in the outpatient setting. This report can be found on PFC's website at www.pharmacyfoundation.org.
The report contains 12 recommendations for addressing medication errors in the outpatient setting. Soon after it was published, in March of 2007, PFC decided to make medication errors a primary strategic focus of the organization and began exploring which of the recommendations the Foundation is best positioned to help address. The result of this effort culminated in the creation of a new strategic plan for PFC, which is now available for review at www.pharmacyfoundation.org/strategicplan.
Over the last year, PFC has come to believe that a major barrier to addressing medication errors is the general lack of concern and urgency about the issue, especially on the part of consumers. As a result, PFC has decided to focus its medication error efforts on the ¼ of the Panel’s recommendations that relate to consumer education and awareness about their role in reducing errors. PFC believes this effort to create more concern and urgency about the problems medications can cause will in turn create more demand for services that pharmacists are best trained to provide.
Because PFC believes this effort is so important to pharmacy, we are planning to provide regular updates of our efforts in various CPhA communication vehicles. So, whenever you review a CPhA publication, be sure to keep an eye out for the Foundation updates.
PFC Welcomes New Board Members
At their recent meeting, the PFC Board of Directors officially elected and welcomed two new public Board members: Robert Pack and Gregory Ewing, JD, MPH. Robert has more than 20 years of technology and Internet experience, and after experiencing a family tragedy resulting from the unsafe use of medications in 2004, he started the Pack Foundation (www.troyandalana.org) to spearhead various public safety initiatives. Gregory works at Sutter Health where he concentrates on transactional health care, including physician recruitment, joint ventures, HIPAA Security, contract drafting and regulatory analysis. The entire leadership of PFC is honored to have both of these wonderful gentlemen on board.
New Online System Announced To Curb Rx Drug Abuse
On Wednesday, California Attorney General Jerry Brown unveiled a plan to provide physicians and pharmacists with an online database of patients' prescription histories as a way to help fight prescription drug abuse. The announcement was made in Los Angeles at a press conference where Jeff Goad, Steve Gray and new PFC Board member Bob Pack were in attendance. The event also kicked-off a fundraising effort to obtain the money needed to develop this program through a public-private partnership involving the Troy and Alana Pack Foundation, Kaiser Permanente, the California State Board of Pharmacy and the attorney general’s office. Bob Pack, whose children were killed in a car accident resulting from the driver's prescription drug abuse, has pledged to help raise $3.5 million to create the database. The system could be operational in as few as 10 months and would be voluntary for physicians and pharmacists to use. See “in the news” below for several articles regarding this announcement.
USC Student Film Wins!
Last week, I encouraged you to vote for USC student Bonnie Hui’s video about the impact of the ten percent budget cuts. The video is actually a team effort that is comprised of Marshal Abdullah, Michael Nguyen, Dolce Wang, Bonnie Hui, and Greg Hung. With that said,I’m pleased to announce that the video won the Summer of Change 08 video contest and will now be seen on television. Congratulations Bonnie, what a great accomplishment and what a great way to get the message about these disastrous cuts for pharmacy out in the news! You can view a one-minute version of the video by visiting YouTube. We’ll keep you posted on when/where the commercial will be played.
NCPA Request for Nominations for 2008
In the News
"I'm not a social program, I'm not a number, I'm a human being," said Janine Ford from her wheelchair. You can read the rest of this article in the Grass Valley Union regarding Medi-Cal cuts and the threats to patients by clicking here.
Assembly Speaker Karen Bass outlined a Democratic budget proposal Thursday that raises more than $6 billion in tax revenue, using the money to boost education spending and help avoid deep cuts in health and social service programs. You can read more about the Assembly Speaker’s plan through her news release or in the San Jose Mercury News and in the San Francisco Chronicle.
State Atty. Gen. Jerry Brown unveiled a plan earlier this week to provide doctors and pharmacists with almost instant Internet access to patient prescription drug histories to help prevent so-called doctor shopping and other abuses of pharmaceuticals. You can read the Los Angeles Times article here or the San Jose Mercury News article here.
Last week, a $9.5 million settlement was reached with Express Scripts Inc., which handles the drug benefits of about 50 million workers. To read the full Fresno Bee article, click here.
Question of the Week
Dear Lynn,
I think that our members might be interested in some of the upcoming FDA webcasts that are available. Will you please include information in this Friday’s message?
Thanks,
Cathi Lord
CPhA Director of Communications
Answer
Dear Cathi,
Sure here is the information from the FDA email:
“FDAAdvisoryCommittee.Com invites you to view our upcoming LIVE broadcast schedule of FDA Drug Advisory Committee meetings. Visit us at www.FDAAC.com for easy online signups to view our LIVE webcasts.”
Readers please note that these webinars have a cost associated with them but are reasonable and contain valuable information.
Thank you for the question.
Sincerely,
Lynn Rolston
Chief Executive Officer
To reach Lynn directly, please DO NOT reply to this message, but email her directly at lrolston@cpha.com.
Thank you.