USA Today Reports on Pharmacy Boards

// January 2nd, 2009 // Pharmacy Regulations

Kevin McCoy, USA Today Reporter, has published an “expose” focused on the fact that over 25% of pharmacy board members are employed by one of nine chain retail pharmacies.  I am actually suprised that the percentage is not much higher – considering the percentage of prescriptions dispensed by chain retail pharmacies. It is much more likely that 50% – 75% of all prescriptions dispensed in the US are done amongst the nine largest chain drugstores. I’m not sure that their current representation on state boards is inappropriate, although I do agree that conflicts of interest can too easily arise when corporate management for the chains serve on these regulatory boards.

For the full story go to http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/health/2008-12-30-pharmacies-boards-mistakes-prescriptions_N.htm 

As a matter of full disclosure… I have (or had) working relationships with several of the chain managers mentioned in the story.

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