Innovations aid expansion of services
As Lewis Drug marks its 75th year in business, its long-term success “still comes down to relationships,” according to Bill Ladwig, SVP of professional services.
“If people mention pharmacy in the Sioux Falls area, they think of Lewis,” he said. Indeed, Lewis’s strong identity as a prime pharmacy and health resource extends to dozens of communities in South Dakota, northwestern Iowa and Minnesota, mirroring its expansion into those markets over the past decade, largely via the acquisition of independent pharmacies in smaller towns and rural communities. That buyout program dramatically expanded Lewis’s reach and gave it a smaller, more traditional pharmacy- and health-focused drug store format called Lewis Family Drug.
The company’s newest expansion vehicle is telepharmacy. Lewis set up its first telepharmacy kiosk within a Lewis Family Drug store in a rural market some 20 miles from Sioux Falls in early July, overseen on a live basis by remote pharmacists working in other Lewis drug stores.
A pharmacist will continue to staff the store one day a week, and technicians will continue to provide dispensing services. “It’s the evolution of small-town health care,” Ladwig said.
Innovations and outreach
Ladwig joined Lewis in 1978 as a staff pharmacist, when the chain consisted of five stores in and around the Sioux Falls, S.D., market, and has been a key architect of many of Lewis’s pharmacy and patient-health innovations ever since.
One area in which Lewis has been a pioneer has been flu vaccinations, going back to the early 1990s. Fast forward 25 years, and South Dakota is ranked first in the nation for per-capita flu immunizations, according to Ladwig. “I think it’s because we got engaged early in promoting it,” he said.
Under Ladwig’s tutelage, Lewis also has developed other sustained community care programs, including an annual screening event called Melanoma Monday, created two decades ago and held in early May.
“We bring all the dermatologists of Sioux Falls together and create a waiting room environment with temporary curtains, and the dermatologists volunteer to conduct this 10- or 12-hour service for free,” said president and CEO Mark Griffin. “They donate their time for the good of the community.”
Lewis created another program that has become embedded in a growing number of communities, “The Big Squeeze,” which is an education and screening effort to expand public awareness of the dangers of high blood pressure. “We started with a small group and got the churches involved,” Ladwig said. “Then the city started taking notice of this … and embedded it into their wellness program. Now the city is running our Big Squeeze program.”
“We got the local health plans engaged in this, too,” he added. “We have pharmacy and nursing students who volunteer. Hy-Vee and Walgreens now also participate. It’s ecumenical.”
To further that integrated model, Sanford and Lewis now can communicate via an online portal. Lewis has read-only access to patients’ EHRs through the portal, and is working to develop applications that will further collaborative care efforts.