Walgreens 2013 Annual Report Download - page 6

The pharmacy profession has always played a key role in America’s health-
care system. In the future, as pharmacists and nurse practitioners practice
at the top of their professions, together they can help fill the gap in primary
care, expand health and wellness, and lower overall healthcare costs.
A new IMS study in June supports this point. Improper and unnecessary
use of medicines, it found, increased healthcare costs by more than
$200 billion in 2012, about 8 percent of the nation’s total healthcare
spending that year. The study singled out pharmacists as “particularly
well positioned” to address this crisis by helping patients “through frequent
and direct communication … about responsible use of medicines.”
More broadly, the study found “Pharmacies are capable of, and have been
taking on, greater responsibility to provide more primary care services.”
We agree wholeheartedly, and Walgreens is well positioned to serve the
growing demand for pharmacy-led health and well-being services through
our strategy to transform community pharmacy and its three main goals:
First, to deliver comprehensive care across our strong base of healthcare
assets, including more than 70,000 healthcare service providers at
our 8,100-plus store locations, nearly 400 Healthcare Clinics staffed
by nurse practitioners and physician’s assistants co-located with our
pharmacies, 370 workplace health centers on major employer campuses
and 200 health system pharmacies.
Second, to offer an easy, expert experience for patients, healthcare providers
and payers that differentiates Walgreens from its competitors.
Third, to be the strategic partner of choice – seeking targeted partnerships
and pursuing joint initiatives with healthcare providers and payers.
This year, for example, Walgreens formed Accountable Care Organizations
with three leading physician groups in Texas, Florida and New Jersey.
Walgreens is pursuing these goals through our core pharmacy business
(providing traditional medication through our retail stores and mail),
and by expanding into two fast-growing healthcare segments: first, in
specialty pharmacy, serving people with complex, chronic diseases including
HIV/hepatitis C, rheumatoid arthritis, multiple sclerosis and cystic fibrosis;
second, in health and wellness services, including meeting new nonemergency
and outpatient care needs arising from the national Affordable Care Act.
Walgreens is becoming a key part of the community healthcare delivery
team, supporting primary care physicians, health plans and health systems
to address patient needs and gaps in care.
For example, our in-store Healthcare Clinics are further expanding their
health service offerings well beyond minor and episodic care. This year we
introduced assessment, treatment and management for chronic conditions
such as hypertension, diabetes, high cholesterol, asthma and others,
as well as additional preventive health services. We have a long-term
partnership with Theranos, Inc., to provide innovative lab testing services
in Walgreens pharmacies.
As our Well Experience strategy moves pharmacists out from behind the
counter to better counsel patients on the proper use of medication and to
expand our scope of services, we are enabling our healthcare professionals
to provide even more advanced care through store design, automation,
and healthcare information technology. Harnessing technology tools such
as electronic medical records, shared billing and scheduling platforms and
integrated data, Walgreens can provide a holistic view of each patient for
health plans, physicians and other health system partners.
With our expanding healthcare assets and innovations, Walgreens is fast
becoming “part of the solution” to the nation’s changing healthcare system
and needs. We are meeting what has been described as healthcare’s
“triple aim”: Improving patient experience, driving better health
outcomes, and lowering overall healthcare costs.
Already, Walgreens is the long-standing private sector leader in providing
vaccinations, administering a total of 8.5 million this year alone.
As we provide convenient access to this preventive healthcare measure,
our immunization program demonstrates the growing patient confidence
in pharmacists as an important member of their healthcare team.
We will continue to advance our leadership.
Walgreens healthcare innovations have not gone unnoticed. For the third
time in four years, Fast Company magazine elected Walgreens as one of
the healthcare industry’s most innovative companies for leadership and
innovation in healthcare services – from our ongoing transformation of
community pharmacy highlighted by our Well Experience store format –
to our combination of health and technology through development of
award-winning mobile applications and web tools to help people manage
their health – to our public-private initiatives with the U.S. Centers for
Disease Control and Prevention, U.S. Department of Health and Human
Services and others to improve access to healthcare services, while creating
a new standard for the patient-pharmacist relationship.
And we are only getting started.
Establishing an Efficient Global Platform
As we create a Well Experience and transform community pharmacy,
Walgreens – together with Alliance Boots and AmerisourceBergen –
is elevating these growth strategies across the United States and beyond.
A world of opportunities is waiting as the global market is also a growing
market for healthcare solutions. Today, nearly a billion people live in
the U.S. and Europe and by 2020, that number could reach 1.1 billion.
Like America, the global market is also an aging market with increased
healthcare spending – 5 percent annual growth in Europe alone.
Growth opportunities range from expanding consumer choices of the
world’s best products to making supply chains and delivery systems more
efficient and effective, expanding access and lowering costs.
To seize these opportunities, we reached across the Atlantic and forged
a strategic partnership with Alliance Boots. A bit about Alliance Boots:
In 2006, the Boots drugstore chain known across London merged
with Alliance Healthcare to become the world’s leading integrated
wholesale-retail pharmacy provider. The Walgreens-Alliance Boots
partnership brought the best of two iconic brands together to further
advance the retail drugstore concept in America and across the world.
4 2013 Walgreens Annual Report
AmerisourceBergen customer orders for specialty products are
packed for distribution in Louisville, Kentucky. AmerisourceBergen
has 25 pharmaceutical distribution centers and three specialty
distribution facilities across the U.S.