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Creativity and Innovation – In Pharmacy, both may need an injection
Creativity and innovation are terms constantly used in the world of business, but what do they really mean in that context? The dictionary defines creativity as: “the ability to transcend traditional ideas, rules, patterns, relationships, or the like, and to create meaningful new ideas, forms, methods, interpretations, etc.; originality, progressiveness, or imagination” For an actual example of creativity I turned to Seth Godin, and he did not fail me. “One of my favorite triumphs of all time happened…
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Patient Engagement – Start With The Salutation
Health is a very personal business and trust is a very important element in the “engagement” mix as far as delivering information about conditions or medications, and the mentoring required when transferring knowledge and understanding. Engagement is a two-way process and involves system and style. For example, I have often used my knowledge of family…
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Blue Ocean Strategy – It Fits a New Pharmacy Model
Pharmacists have described the community pharmacy environment for as long as I can remember, as being restrictive and confined, no matter the physical size of the pharmacy. They call it the “four-wall syndrome” and it is, in fact, a form of depression. The one thing that characterises the profession overall is that there is little…
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Define Your Pharmacy Frustum
I was performing my regular reading of my emails when I came across the latest words of wisdom from Seth Godin. Seth always seems to read my mind, and his emails often cross over with a period of time when I may be thinking about a pharmacy problem, but finding difficulty in trying to express…
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Danish Malpractice System Provides Integrity, Safety, and an Education Resource
It is depressingly common and it has recently happened here in Australia. A patient leaves hospital, or a doctor’s surgery or from a pharmacy with a medication such as Methotrexate with instructions stating “one tablet daily” instead of “one tablet weekly”. The patient is damaged or dies, and there begins the problem of who to…
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Local Education –Forums to the future
As a management consultant my objective was always to delegate an owner-manager out of their business. The process usually took two years and during that period every single staff person was retrained to a different way of thinking about their workplace through on-the-job mentoring and the process of delegation. Thus, the business owners could actually take…
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Collaboration- What does it mean for health professions?
The new “buzz” word floating around the health professions is “collaboration”. In the same breath it is linked to other expressions such as “patient-centred homes” or “patient-centred neighbourhoods”. But what does it all mean – particularly when referenced in respect of community pharmacy? Starting with the dictionary terminology we find collaboration means: 1. “the action…
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Taking the Initiative with Co-Pay
Chemist Warehouse, as you would have imagined, has taken the initiative to discount the co-pay for PBS prescriptions by $1.00. The impact on a retail pharmacy like the warehouse model is not quite the same as for a community pharmacy, because budgets for retail pharmacies are geared for lower profit percentages combined with higher turnover…
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Countdown Has Commenced And It Is Woolworths’ Pharmacy Being Launched
In an article I wrote on June 1, 2015, I said: “Influential shareholders of Woolworths are seeking to invite Roger Corbett, the nemesis of Australian pharmacy, back into the fold as chairman.” “Corbett has been carefully planning succession to his current position of chairman of Fairfax Media Ltd citing very early in the process that…
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Engage with Marijuana Opportunities
With the recent announcement by Minister for Health, Sussan Ley, that Australia will have a single licencing system for the controlled cultivation of cannabis, Australia will now have a streamlined system for medical or scientific cannabis development and production which will avoid some of the problems in other countries where it has not been appropriately…