A shot in the arm for your pharmacy.

Forgive the cliché of the post's title, I couldn't help myself.

What I'm talking about here is having your pharmacy provide flu vaccinations for the upcoming season. If you can do it than I would encourage you to do so. There are many benefits your pharmacy can enjoy if you choose to provide this service.

My pharmacy has already given one round of flu shots and is poised to do another the first week of November. You only have to give flu shots one or two days total for it to be worthwhile.
By choosing to give our flu shots on our historically slowest day of the week, we increased the number of scripts we filled that day above our normal due to the increased traffic. We also had a good number of individuals who have never traded with us come in to our store for the shot. Getting new customers in the store is half the battle because now you get to provide them with the great service they might not get at other pharmacies, encouraging them to come back again. Giving flu shots was also seen as a community service. Many doctor's offices are no longer providing them. And while the Health Department was able to give shots for free, we had many people willing to pay to not have to spend all day out there and virtually everyone the received a flu shot was thankfully we provided them. We had a really great turnout the first time with nothing more than in-store advertising. This next time we may put something in the Sunday paper the weekend before.

I realize I may be coming in with this a little late for some (with the best times to give flu shots in October and November). However, I still think it's worth suggesting none the less.

Each state is different on what exactly you can and can't do as a pharmacy with providing inoculations. Most states will allow the pharmacist to give shots. Some require being registered to do so while others may not. It's best to check with your state board first (isn't it always?). One option is to just hire a nurse for the day to give the shots. If your pharmacy is like ours, you probably have a report with many nurses at doctors offices in your area. You can get the word out and probably find someone who can come in for that day and you can simply pay cash to at a much cheaper rate than from a service.

Another thing to consider is documentation. You need to get a signed release and also proved information about the vaccine to everyone who gets it. All we did was find a flu vaccine release online (there are several), download and change it for our pharmacy (ie replacing the names, dates, etc.). The VIS handouts are fromthe CDC at http://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/pubs/vis/default.htm#flu . Keep the releases in a folder and easily retrievable for at least a year.

As far as getting the vaccine, I'm not promoting these sellers (if you can find someone else you like better, go for it) but I know they have the vaccine and can get it out to you. The first is from www.myfluvaccine.com. The other is from www.vippharm.com.

I would work with an average of $15 to give a shot (that's the cost of the vaccine, needles, gloves, alcohol, sharps disposal, other costs, and personnel). Pricing the vaccine to the public at between $20-$25 is probably what you'd want to do. That's about the threshold the public is will to pay for the convenience of not having to go to the Health Dept., doing it at their schedule, etc. It's alright to only get enough vaccine for 100 vaccinations. That might sound like a small amount but I would really recommend seeing how it goes before getting stuck with a lot of vaccination you don't get to use. 100 vaccinations is a good amount for one day's worth of providing shots. If it costs $1,500 to provide shots, at $20 a shot you would only need to give 75 shots to break even (60 if you do it for $25). Breaking even is a very good thing to do because, remember, you'll still get all these other benefits above just the shots themselves.

Now this next part I'm really going to stress: provide these shots for cash only! It will be much more worthwhile to simple do cash and carry than try and mess with insurance companies and Medicare which most of you won't be able to do anyway. Surprisingly, having this policy will only deter a very, very small amount of people from get flu shots from you.

I hope this was a decent first real post. I'm sure the more I post the better these posts will be to read. If anyone of readers has provided flu shots at their pharmacies and/or has experiences with flu shots please share them. I'm sure everyone would benefit from any comments those that have gone before could provide.