CarePlus Pharmacy is part of the Navi Group, Ireland’s fastest-growing independent retail pharmacy group. They launched their first store in 2015, and now operate over 60 stores throughout Ireland.
Their goal is simple – empowering people to lead healthy and happy lives. CarePlus partnered with Medihive in 2019 when we developed proof of concept ideas for “click and collect” services.
The Challenge
CarePlus, like other pharmacies nationwide, were a late inclusion to the COVID-19 vaccination rollouts. Unlike national vaccination centres where appointment invitations were restricted to 2-year age brackets, anyone between 18-34 years old could book a pharmacy appointment. This made it difficult for CarePlus to schedule appointments and manage the limited, variable supply of vaccines it received.
They faced a number of challenges, including the lack of a national patient database. This resulted in duplicate appointments and valuable resources being wasted. Capturing mandatory information proved to be extremely time-consuming with in-store staff needing 10-15 minutes per patient to fill in screening forms. Staff were also spending 16-20 hours per week booking, cancelling and rescheduling patient appointments, and communicating with patients via phone or email. In addition to the above mentioned challenges, pharmacists were also facing social distancing protocols which exacerbated resource issues and increased processing times. This meant front-line pharmacy staff were managing highly stressed patients – not an ideal situation for staff or their patients.
Our Solution
Medihive’s virtual pharmacy solution allowed CarePlus to easily schedule, manage, and communicate with patients online.
Through the platform, CarePlus were able to:
- Distribute vaccine appointments across a nationwide network of pharmacies, all online and with only one line of HTML code – no development was required by CarePlus
- Manage registrations and duplicates with our custom waiting list, specifically developed to address vaccine rollout challenges
- Boost appointment frequency with automated pre-screen clinical data collection
- Ensure all mandatory patient information was captured pre-appointment, freeing up in-store staff and resources
The Results
- 100,000 bookings in the first 24 hours with no loss of service
- €3,000 in operational time savings generated per pharmacy
- The Navi Group generated over €100,000 in savings
- Very positive feedback from front-line staff concerning reduced stress
- Turnkey solution, with no need for web developer support
- CarePlus attracted new customers from competitors
- Reputation from ease of services raised CarePlus brand equity
“Medihive has been a phenomenal help with our vaccination programmes. It ensures our pharmacists spend less time on patient admins and more time with the patient. The team are very responsive and are constantly making updates to the product to meet pharmacists’ needs.”
Siobhan Kellett, Health & Wellness Manager, CarePlus
