New Baden’s Prescriptions Plus Closes Permanently
Prescriptions Plus, once located inside New Baden’s IGA, has now closed permanently.
The New Baden Pharmacy, Prescriptions Plus, once located inside the New Baden IGA has permanently closed. Run by long time pharmacy owner, Bob Nave, their doors suddenly closed permanently on Wednesday, April 12.
Although Nave was unavailable for comments, local Pharmacist and owner of Prescriptions Plus in Lebanon, Lou Schlaefer had made investments in the pharmacy and gave an inside look into what happened and why they closed. “They decided to close their doors because of the lower margins brought on by pharmaceutical benefit managers and insurance companies. That’s where the problem really lies. They were getting squeezed out of a lot of plans and they couldn’t participate so their volume was going down.”
What this means is that the pharmacy had been making less money as a result of changes made to the industry by middlemen between pharmaceutical manufacturers and pharmaceutical providers such as local pharmacies and changes made by insurance companies in recent years.
At the time of closing, Prescriptions Plus in New Baden sold their files to Walgreens in O’Fallon at 704 Cambridge Blvd.
Lou Schlaefer continued, explaining that he is welcoming any displaced pharmacy-goers to come to his Lebanon Prescriptions Plus and noted some of the expansions his pharmacy is currently undergoing. “Many of the people are transferring their prescriptions over to us here in Lebanon. We are happy to say that Diane Lippert, who was the other pharmacist over there, has moved over to work with us. She will join our Pharmacist staff of myself and Kristen Wheeler. We are happy to take care of anybody who wants to transfer to us, we are happy to help them. We are getting ready to move into our original building in early fall. We’ve expanded our pharmacy by over 300 square ft and increased our over the counter selection. We expect to be in business here for a long time to come.”
Its because the pharmacy is forced to sign contracts to get paid by their competition who is also their payor, not a supply chain issue.
Many times these small pharmacies do not carry many medications, which causes patients to go to the larger pharmacies
Most likely that pharmacy’s contract required that pharmacy to dispense medication at an acquisition cost loss if it was in stock, but doesnt require the pharmacy to order and dispense it at a loss. Its a contracting issue, not a supply chain issue. These contracts are take it or leave it contracts written by the same companies that would prefer you use their chain pharmacy or their mail order. I can understand your frustration, but its not what it looks like at firat glance.