In this new blog series, we're highlighting some of the awesome features of Hint Clinical, our clinical application that includes the functionality of a modern EMR, practice management app, and patient communications platform in one technology. As more and more Direct Primary Care (DPC) practices are adopting All-in-One, it’s clear that the simple user experience and robust functionality is making life easier for the clinicians that have migrated.
For this first feature spotlight, we want to showcase the built-in functionality of In-House Dispensing. If you're in one of the 43 states where physicians are allowed to dispense medications onsite, here are a few reasons that you might want to consider offering this service to your patients with the help of Clinical.
There are great advantages to offering in-house dispensing at your Direct Primary Care office. By prescribing and dispensing all in house, you can offer wholesale pricing to your patients and save them the trip to the pharmacy. In-house dispensing can become a strong revenue stream for your practice. You can offer your medications at a better price for patients with chronic conditions who need a steady supply by adding it on to their monthly membership and for patients who don’t need recurring prescriptions, have a point of sale price. By giving patients the option to get their prescribed medications directly from your DPC practice, you are providing tremendous value, particularly for uninsured and underinsured patients.
Adding another item to your list of things to manage for your direct care practice may feel daunting, but Hint Clinical makes prescribing and dispensing easy. When it’s time to dispense medication to a patient, the amount prescribed gets automatically deducted from the inventory and the appropriate charge added to the patient's next invoice. From there you just print the label and you’re all set.
Managing inventory levels is seamless as you indicate when you’d like to get notifications to restock based on your preferences. There are visuals that show you what your inventory quantities are in real-time. When it’s time to account for new inventory, you simply navigate to medication, enter the NDC number and the system will auto populate the rest of medication information. Your only step from there is to include that lot number, expiration date, cost, markup and quantity.
Currently, the only states that don’t allow in-house dispensing are Utah, Wyoming, Texas, Arkansas, and Massachusetts, while New York and New Jersey are restrictive states that have strict limitations on the prescription supply you can dispense of 72 hours and 7 days respectively, which make it nearly infeasible. So unfortunately, if you are in one of those states, dispensing at your clinic with the help of Clinical is not an option. However, If your state does allow in-house dispensing however, be sure to check on the Board of Pharmacy regulations as certain medications may have limits on how much inventory you can carry and some may require additional registration.
If you’d like to explore more features of Hint Clinical, schedule a demo with our team today!