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Anti-HCV Therapy Starts Faster, Finishes More Often With Community Pharmacy Than Medicaid Mail-Order System
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IDWeek 2023, October 11-15, 2023, Boston
Mark Mascolini
Using a contracted community pharmacy instead of Managed Medicare's Preferred Specialty Pharmacies-a mail-order system-to fill anti-HCV prescriptions resulted in significantly shorter time to starting therapy [1]. This 752-person analysis by Newark, New Jersey's North Jersey Community Research Initiative (NJCRI) also found that using a community pharmacy yielded significantly more HCV treatment completions.
NJCRI, a mobile HCV clinic in northern New Jersey, recently added a contracted community pharmacy in hopes of providing "seamless care and coordination" between people with HCV infection, their providers, and their pharmacy. In a retrospective observational review of people treated for HCV from October 2020 through September 2022, NJCRI researchers compared prescription-related outcomes in 138 people (22% of the study group) required to use Medicaid's mail-order system with 476 people (78% of the group) who used NJCRI's local contracted community-based pharmacy.
Average time to starting therapy was 36 days with Medicaid's mail-order system versus less than half that-15 days-with the community pharmacy. Proportions of people who started and completed anti-HCV therapy came to 81% in the mail-order group versus 92% in the community pharmacy group, a significant difference (P = 0.0003). The fraction of people lost to follow-up (dropped out of care) proved twice higher with mail-order prescriptions than with the community pharmacy-19% versus 8%.
The NJCRI team concluded that community pharmacy handling of anti-HCV therapy "positively affects patient care and adherence because of the convenience and support to the patients as well as the providers." But the results are not completely conclusive because the researchers did not report comparisons sociodemographic and clinical parameters in the two patient groups. For example, the first group's need to use the Medicaid mail-order prescription system could mean they are poorer, less mobile people who suffer many disadvantages in care of HCV infection and other diseases.
Reference
1. Rosmarin-DeStefano C, Slim J, Tempalski B, et al. Impact of an innovative community based pharmacy HCV elimination in New Jersey. IDWeek 2023, October 11-15, 2023, Boston, Mass.
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IMPACT OF AN INNOVATIVE COMMUNITY BASED CONTRACTED PHARMACY ON HCV ELIMINATION IN NEW JERSEY, USA
ID Werk 2023 Oct 11
Authors: Rosmarin-DeStefano C1, Slim J1, Tempalski B1, Leyden K1, Levaggi E1, Finkel D1,2, Duprey S1, Torres J1, Armanious D1, Armanious A1, Olsson T1
1North Jersey Community research Initiative (NJCRI)
2Rutgers University Medical School
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