SACRAMENTO, Calif. — The California Pharmacists Association (CPhA) has partnered with PrescribeWellness in the "One Million More" flu shot campaign.
CPhA said Wednesday that the initiative with PrescribeWellness, a provider of digital communication solutions in health care, aims to boost the year-over-year flu vaccination rate by 1 million immunizations. That will be done by donating 10 million communications to flu shot administrators to educate their patients through personalized communications that stress the importance and ease of getting a flu vaccine.
Also through One Million More, PrescribeWellness will team up with CPhA and its more than 2,000 member pharmacies to create and deliver millions of personalized communications to inform individuals about the need to get vaccinated for flu.
CPhA and PrescribeWellness kicked off the One Million More campaign Wednesday on the steps of the California Capitol Building in Sacramento. The effort also offered free flu shots that day to the public from one of the CPhA member pharmacists in attendance.
"The California Pharmacists Association is excited to partner with PrescribeWellness on the California One Million More flu shot campaign," CPhA chief executive officer Jon Roth said in a statement. "This initiative demonstrates the important role that pharmacists play as the most accessible health care provider in a community. Today, pharmacists do much more than safely dispense medication. They provide immunizations, diabetes management, cholesterol screenings and an array of other important health services.”
CPhA and PrescribeWellness reported that one in five Americans get the influenza virus each year because of less-than-ideal flu immunization rates, especially among high-risk groups such as children, the elderly and people with chronic illnesses.
"The challenge of driving flu shots is making the public aware of the importance of receiving one," stated Paul Lofholm, owner and pharmacist at Ross Valley Pharmacy in Marin, Calif. "I’ve used this [PrescribeWellness] technology to reach out to my entire patient population and saw significant growth in flu shot volumes over previous years, and my patients really liked that I personally called them."
PrescribeWellness’ digital solutions provide automated and personalized communications via multiple channels — voice, e-mail and text messaging — to spur behavioral change in patients, educate them and motivate them to act to improve their health care outcomes. According to PrescribeWellness, the solutions can help pharmacy patients improve in such areas as medication adherence as well as enhance pharmacy customer service and patient loyalty, in turn increasing pharmacy revenue and profitability.
