Margins are tight everywhere in healthcare, but a hospital's pharmacy department has a strong capacity to bring
value — especially if that organization has an established chief pharmacy officer as part of its C-suite.
Every patient who comes to the hospital will interact in some way with the pharmacy department. In addition to a
hospital pharmacist's role ensuring the safe and effective use of medications, they have a wide range of
responsibilities including:
- Regulatory compliance: Pharmacists ensure pharmaceutical regulatory protocols are in place and
enforced. Some of these recent regulations include new Medicare guidelines, the Drug Supply Chain Security Act,
340B regulations and more.
- Technology: Pharmacists often interact and engage with a variety of technologies, including
leveraging artificial intelligence to improve the medication use process, optimizing contract management systems
and ensuring patient care through telehealth. They also must understand and keep track of the entirety of the
supply chain and revenue cycle via various data systems.
- Clinical care: Pharmacists at the executive level champion leading clinical practices —
spanning ambulatory and inpatient care — often across multiple facilities within a health system. They are one of
the primary clinicians responsible for a patient's drug therapy and essential to disease state and comprehensive
medication management. Their activities run the gamut — from preventative care and medication device use education
to antibiotic selection and complex medication dose adjustment in multiple organ system failure.
- Quality improvement: Nearly all quality improvement initiatives and measures within a hospital
touch pharmacy in some way. Some examples include decreasing systemwide medication errors, managing sepsis bundles
to improve patient outcomes and decreasing hospital-acquired infections through multidisciplinary partnerships.
- Population health: Pharmacists are critical to the continuum of care within their communities
and serve those populations through comprehensive care. They promote community education around common health
issues like smoking cessation and vaccine adherence.
Pharmacists also keep a pulse on trends and the changing healthcare landscape — from rising drug costs to payer and
reimbursement model dynamics, and pressures coming from various market disruptors.
Healthcare systems estimate that at least 25% of overall system net revenue is attributed to pharmacy, which means
that it could easily make or break a hospital's margin. Chief financial officers are realizing the pharmacy
department is no longer a simple cost center or ancillary department, but rather is a high-value enterprise with
significant influence over an organization's financial sustainability.
Within the past 50 years, the C-suite has evolved and expanded to include chief medical officers, chief nursing
officers and other C-level executives who are integral to patient care. It only makes sense pharmacy should follow
suit, given its expanding responsibilities within patient care and growing financial impact. There are currently at
least 100 pharmacy leaders with chief pharmacy officer titles across the nation's health systems, highlighting the
ongoing trend toward including this role at the C-suite level.
A chief pharmacy officer should be viewed as a coveted enterprise asset. Pharmacists today are building specialty
pharmacies, infusion centers and 340B programs that are optimizing revenue streams for health systems and improving
patient care. They're combatting rising drug prices by navigating dynamic legislative and payer-influenced
environments. Pharmacy leaders also are executing innovative alternatives, such as establishing their own 503B
compounding facilities and pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs) and having a licensed pharmacist who can speak to those
complex processes is critical.
Pharmacy is a business within the overall healthcare system, accounting for a significant amount of an
organization's revenue and non-labor spend and navigating complex regulatory policies — all while ensuring patient
care and safety. Pharmacy's role and impact within a healthcare system will only increase as time continues;
committing to and establishing a chief pharmacy officer at your organization is more than just advantageous — it's
vital.