Q&A: How Ōmcare’s Home Health Hub Eases Caregiver, Pharmacy Shortages

As a way to combat the ongoing issues of pharmacy deserts and caregiver shortages, health care leaders across the US have come together to launch initiatives intended to improve health outcomes on a national scale.

In the Rural Health Innovation Initiative, powered by Ōmcare’s Home Health Hub technology, pharmacy leaders are making access to both providers and medication more convenient than ever.

“Instead of expecting the patient to go to care or expecting the caregiver to be physically present, we bring the care to the home through technology,” Lisa Lavin, founder, chairman, and CEO of Ōmcare, told Drug Topics®. “The hub automates the scheduling and dispensing that works with the caregiver.”

With the program initially launched in a rural Minnesota community, its leaders hope to scale it and make a real difference for the hundreds of thousands of underserved communities across the country.

In part 2 of our interview with Lavin, she shared with us how the Rural Health Innovation Initiative works, exploring the crucial gaps her company’s technology was designed to fill.

READ MORE: Rural Pharmacy Desert Initiative Uses Tech, Partnerships to Expand Access

Drug Topics: Can you dive a bit deeper into the capabilities of Ōmcare’s Home Health Hub and how it’s affected patients’ lives?

Lisa Lavin: The hub is an all-in-one device, or appliance if you will, that sits in someone’s home, either in the kitchen or bedside table, or wherever they want to put it. It combines really 3 very important things: medication management, pharmacy and caregiver access, and human connection. It holds up to a 30-day supply of presorted medication that is pouched; medications that are delivered to a person’s door by PharMerica. When it’s time for them to take their meds, the hub alerts the person, dispenses the right pouch at the right time, and also then tracks adherence. There’s no more pill sorting, there’s no more missed doses, no more confusion about what to take when.

It also has a one-touch button that connects you directly to a pharmacist 24/7, so there’s no navigating a phone tree, no driving 30 miles to the nearest pharmacy. It enables simple one-touch video calls with family and caregivers. For someone living in a rural community, that combination is transformative. It means they can stay in their home longer. They can manage their health safely and stay connected with family and friends without relying on somebody else to drive them somewhere.

Drug Topics: In what ways does bringing care directly into the home help mitigate the impact of current caregiver or pharmacy shortages?

Lisa Lavin: The real issues that we’re all facing is this massive caregiver shortage in our country that’s only getting worse. You look at the statistics; we’ve got 11,000 people every day turning age 65. Today, we may have 7-to-1 caregivers for every senior, but by 2030, in less than 5 years, that ratio is going to go down to 4 to 1, and soon thereafter 3 to 1. So, what do we do?

We know we have to extend the reach of caregivers, and then we have to compile on top of that the issue of a pharmacy desert where we have pharmacies that are closing, and we have 46% of all US counties that have at least one pharmacy or health care desert. This traditional model of going to the pharmacy, going to the doctor, having a caregiver come to you is breaking down. It is unsustainable, especially in rural areas.

Our model is designed to flip that. Instead of expecting the patient to go to care or expecting the caregiver to be physically present, we bring the care to the home through technology. The hub automates the scheduling and dispensing that works with the caregiver that would otherwise need to do so. Also, by having that 24/7 pharmacy line means that a patient doesn’t need someone to drive them to the pharmacist, and that monthly nurse check-in provides clinical touchpoints without requiring an in-person visit. By no means does this replace human care. Matter of fact, the model is designed that it extends caregiver reach and pharmacy reach into the home.

READ MORE: How Pharmacy Deserts Threaten Access as Closures Rise Nationwide