MinuteClinic seeks to expand its presence in the healthcare world

WOONSOCKET, R.I. New healthcare legislation, the aging U.S. population and a shortage of primary care physicians will equal significant growth for CVS Caremark's MinuteClinic business. In fact, the clinic operator is looking to double its number of in-store clinics within five years, according to a Bloomberg report.

"There will be a gap in the number of providers available in an already constrained system," CVS Caremark CFO Dave Denton told Bloomberg in a phone interview. "Our MinuteClinics are a very nice complement to that environment. We will easily double the number of clinics and maybe even more than that."

MinuteClinic currently has 500 locations in 25 states, making it the largest such provider.

The company will bolster the number of in-store clinics as baby boomers reach Medicare age and 32 million individuals are added to insurance rolls following passage of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act last month, Denton told Bloomberg.

Denton also told Bloomberg that it will increase the number of services provided at MinuteClinic. The additional services will be geared toward patients with chronic illnesses, but Denton declined to elaborate.

As previously reported by Drug Store News, MinuteClinic already has announced the introduction of new health condition monitoring services for patients with diabetes, high cholesterol, high blood pressure and asthma. The new monitoring services are called Monitoring Made Easy.

Bloomberg also reached out to Take Care Health Systems, which operates 359 clinics and is owned by Walgreens, and Walmart, which also provides in-store health clinics, but they declined to comment on specific expansion plans.