Hospital & Health System Services
The Hospital and Health System Services practice is administered by James Jorgenson, MS, RPh. Each practice specialty is led by a career expert in that area and supported by a team of highly trained pharmacy leaders and business specialists with specific expertise in the various complex aspects of hospital pharmacy practice and associated business functions.
In recognition of the significant portion of hospital revenue represented by Pharmacy, Visante consultants focus on a central core of specialized services to improve patient outcomes and bottom-line financial results.
340B Drug Discount Programs: Set Up and Audit Preparation
Organizations eligible for 340B Drug Discount Program participation have the potential to save 20%-50% on outpatient drug costs. Visante can assess your organization's eligibility and assist with compliant 340B application preparation and 340B program implementation.
Visante has also developed a set of comprehensive 340B audit preparation services in response to the recently authorized 340B program audits by the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) Office of Pharmacy Affairs (OPA). The Visante 340B Integrity and Audit Preparation Assessment will compare your organization's current operations with all existing OPA regulations and GAO recommendations including best practices we have observed in other 340B compliant pharmacies. The HRSA 340B audits have been particularly concerned with evidence of compliant 340B policies and procedures covering Drug Diversion, Duplicate Discount Avoidance, and Contract Pharmacy Oversight. Let our company's 340B team of experts provide a comprehensive review of every facet of the 340B requirements specific to your pharmacy.
Visante practice leads for the 340B Drug Pricing Program are William Wood, Kristin Fox-Smith, Douglas E. Miller, and Michael Kelly.
Pharmacy Revenue Cycle Analysis
The lead for Visante's Revenue Cycle consultant team is Douglas E. Miller, Pharm D. Visante's diagnostic data analysis quickly identifies opportunities for revenue enhancement while quantifying the potential financial impact of incorporating any of the recommended changes. We start with an end-to-end review of the pharmacy revenue cycle. Following assessment of this detailed review, problems are identified and quantified. Examples of some common issues uncovered in this analysis are lost charges, suboptimal pricing, incorrect coding, and inaccurate translation of dispensing-units to billing-units.
Visante's revenue optimization analysis has yielded some amazing benefits to clients. At a 500-bed hospital $10 million in additional gross revenue and almost $3 million in additional collections became available as a result of recommended system fixes.
Specialty Pharmacy Reimbursement Solutions
This rapidly expanding market segment focuses on high cost, high tech drugs that emerge rapidly and offer new therapeutic options and revenue opportunities. Visante pharmacy and reimbursement expert, Kristin Fox-Smith, MPA is the lead for these projects that help clients develop the necessary approach to successfully integrate clinical and financial services. Visante consultants assisted a transplant center to develop its own specialty pharmacy which contributed over $1 million in gross margin during its first full year of operation. At another regional medical center, Visante helped to create an outpatient infusion center that achieved annual revenue of more than $80 million.
Pharmacy Department Assessment
Visante uses a structured process based on proven performance concepts and current best practices as well as an analysis of critical business metrics for this review. The outcome of our assessment is a ranking of the potential for a wide variety of opportunities to improve the contribution of the pharmacy operation to institutional performance goals. Examples of areas to be reviewed include purchasing and contracting, staff training and deployment, formulary management, clinical services, retail pharmacy, specialty pharmacy, patient assistance programs, and employee prescription benefit management.
Employee Prescription Benefit Management
Most organizations outsource management of their employee prescription benefits program to health insurers and PBMs. However, certain healthcare organizations - particularly 340B entities - may have a significant opportunity to reduce costs by filling employee prescriptions in-house. Visante will assess your opportunity and create a plan to restructure employee prescription benefits including delivering outpatient prescriptions to employees via both in-house and contracted pharmacies.
Antimicrobial Solutions Consulting Service
Over the last 50 years as much as half of all antimicrobial use has been recognized as inappropriate.1 The result has been increased microbial resistance, unnecessary toxicity, and an increased chance of readmission due to recurring infection. All of this translates into greater risks to patients, increased costs to all concerned, and jeopardized overall effectiveness of an institution's use of antimicrobials. Microbial resistance is even said to be a threat to global stability and national security.2
Visante's approach to antimicrobial stewardship is to support each healthcare organization by developing a program through multidisciplinary teamwork that will result in administering the optimal antibiotic, at the right dose, and at the right time to improve therapeutic effectiveness. This program is designed to be available for all patients - not just those being treated by infection experts. An effective and customized antimicrobial stewardship program can achieve shortened lengths of stay and lowered antimicrobial expenditures while minimizing resistance development and its potential future impact on healthcare costs.
With this in mind, Visante's consultants begin with an overall assessment of an institution's current bacteriology, prescribing habits, special resistance issues, and current supportive efforts. From this we are able to provide specific recommendations that can significantly lower costs while improving clinical outcomes. Designed by infectious disease physicians and pharmacists, this program is based on specialized education, ongoing information exchange, and team collaboration among providers of patient care.
Visante's Antimicrobial Solutions group is led by William Kelly, Pharm D, FISPE and John Trowbridge, MD, CPE. Under their leadership, this team includes an Infectious Disease physician, an academic researcher with focus on antimicrobial pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics, a physician researcher with expertise in evidence–based medicine, a hospital–based drug information and drug policy specialist, and a pharmacoepidemiologist.
References
1. Anon. Antimicrobial Stewardship. Premier. https://premierinc.com/quality-safety/tools-services/safety/topics/HAI/HAI-antimicrobial-stewardship.jsp. Accessed 8/26/11.2. Fishman N. Antimicrobial stewardship. Am J Med. 2006; 119 (6 Suppl 1):S53-61.
Biomedical Literature Searches Evaluations, and Evidence Tables
Evidence tables provide a rapid summary of client-defined literature searches and evaluations. Elements to be included in an evidence table are usually specified by the client to match a specific purpose, such as evidence-based practices. Typically, our evidence tables include the name of the study, objectives, study design, sample size, results, conclusions, year of the study, and the journal citation where it was published. In addition to information supporting the studies included in the evidence table, our researchers compile a bibliography of other manuscripts that were reviewed but not selected.