Pet Care Corner

Dr. Merle Marks

Timberland Animal Clinic

What it takes to have a pharmacy

There's the UPS delivery man again. We see him so often, we should have a reserved parking spot for him. It seems like we are constantly restocking the pharmacy. I started thinking the other day how for granted I take the fact that we actually have a pharmacy within our clinic. I thought it would be interesting to explain what is involved in starting and maintaining a pharmacy.

The obvious starting point of course is with licenses. As a veterinarian, we must be licensed nationally and in the state we practice in to be able write prescriptions and therefore, to order prescription medications. Becoming licensed requires schooling at an accredited veterinary college and sitting for national and state board exams. The state license must be renewed yearly. To order controlled substances (i.e., anesthetics, narcotics) we must obtain a narcotics license from Drug Enforcement Agency which must be renewed every three years.

To stock a pharmacy from scratch costs tens of thousands of dollars, and a large new clinic could

conceivably spend upwards of $50,000 to $60,000 to stock their shelves with necessary medications and emergency drugs. Most drug distributors will stock your shelves and allow you 1 to 2 years to pay off the bill. However, remember, if you are filling prescriptions during that grace period, you must restock your shelves weekly. I bring up this point because medications

are our biggest overhead expense without fail. Medications are extremely expensive. On average, it takes a pharmaceutical company 10 years to test a drug prior to its being brought to market. There is an extremely large out lay of cash during that waiting period which the company hopes to recoup when the drug is brought to market. If you require medications and your insurance coverage doesn't help with prescriptions, you know how expensive they can be. Many times, pharmaceutical companies will license the drug under a couple different names, one for human use, the other for animal use. Often these are not simultaneous, but it depends on the medication and hype built up prior coming to market.

We must keep current logs of prescriptions filled and controlled substances ordered and used. We are also required to keep extensive regulatory catalogs on all medications in the clinic, as well

as expiration dates. There is quite a bit of bookkeeping involved with having a pharmacy, not to mention occasional inventory counts, which we do quarterly. This involves counting every pill in the clinic, which keeps our computerized inventory levels correct, not to mention removing soon to be expired drugs from the shelf. Having computerized label printers also helps greatly with label instructions. But remember, that means having a printer, labels etc. Needless to say, describing all that is involved with maintaining a pharmacy can be exhaustive. Hopefully next time you get a prescription filled, this article will make the bill a little easier to swallow.