The Waypoint team was in New Jersey last October and just barely managed to get out of Hurricane Sandy's way. Because we were just visiting, we had the luxury of leaving, unlike many others, including your fellow independent community pharmacists. Heroic stories of prescriptions being filled by candle light for patients whose lives depended on their medicine inspired all of us. But what is it that enabled those few pharmacists to hang on, to face down potential disaster?
Topics: community pharmacy owner, community pharmacist, pharmacy contingency plan
Contingency plans are critical to the success of community pharmacy. Unfortunately, we have seen and heard too many times lately that pharmacies are closing or being sold to chains because the owner gets sick or dies.
What happens to your pharmacy tomorrow if you cannot or do not show up to work? This is one of the things that we say is critical, but not urgent. No one wants to think they may get sick or about a natural disaster until it is directly upon us. Rick and I were in Atlantic City, NJ the day before Hurricane Sandy came through for the NJ Pharmacist Convention. We saw the contingency plans of the hotels, casinos and restaurants actually being implemented. They were boarding up windows and evacuating the town. We also saw many of our clients have to work through the aftermath of Hurricane Irene after it devastated the Mid Atlantic. Some of these pharmacies were without electricity for extended periods of time. Not every reason for a contingency plan is as obvious as a natural disaster, here are a few others:
Topics: pharmacy contingency plan, contingency planning for the pharmacy
