DUBLIN, Ohio — At the upcoming 2018 American Society of Health System Pharmacists (ASHP) Midyear Clinical Meeting (December 2-6), Cardinal Health will highlight a comprehensive approach that addresses the top concern of hospital and health system pharmacy leaders: sustainable cost control.

Attendees can visit the Cardinal Health booth, #1211, to discuss this topic with hospital pharmacy experts at ASHP in Anaheim, Calif.

By taking this comprehensive approach, hospital pharmacies can achieve savings of 5 percent or more, year-after-year, noted Kathy Chase, director of Drug Cost Control Services at Cardinal Health. “The role of the pharmacy is uniquely positioned to support the call of health systems to discover savings, boost efficiencies and promote high-quality patient care.”

Through its pharmacy services and specialty pharmaceutical distribution businesses, Cardinal Health helps hospitals analyze and benchmark data to identify hidden savings, improve patient outcomes and drive supply chain efficiencies. Four key steps to this approach will be showcased during the ASHP Midyear Meeting:

• Implementing an RFID-enabled consignment model for inventory optimization
• Leveraging and optimizing patient assistance programs
• Continual analysis of real-time drug expenditures and utilization data
• Ability to leverage products and services to improve productivity, so resources can focus on patient care and cost control

The healthcare industry is seeing a shift in drug spending, with specialty pharmaceuticals outpacing traditional pharmaceutical growth. Specialty pharmaceuticals pose unique storage, usage and cost challenges and often have unpredictable demand. Traditional pharmacy cost savings strategies that focus on managing the purchase price of drugs are not yielding the savings necessary to offset these pressures.

“The need to identify innovative approaches to control costs and increase quality and outcomes will continue to be a focus as specialty drug spend continues to outpace traditional drug spend,” said John Kilgour, vice president of acute and alternate care sales for Specialty Pharmaceutical Distribution at Cardinal Health. “With a consignment model, pharmacies can free up dollars tied up in inventory by only paying for these unique products once they are used.”

The Cardinal Health Consignment Program uses RFID technology to monitor inventory in real time, set par levels based on actual pharmacy usage and send alerts for recalled products. It also allows inventory to be tracked and traced through a cloud-based platform, enabling health systems to gain real-time visibility into inventory levels from anywhere.