Pharmacy options increase in Polson
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POLSON — Providence St. Joseph Medical Center will open another retail pharmacy in Super 1 Foods this August, filling the location vacated by Health Care Plus when that pharmacy moved from the Polson grocery store to the newly-opened Walgreens on Highway 35.
Providence Lakeshore Pharmacy can fill prescriptions from any provider and will be open on Mondays through Saturdays, offering one more day of convenience for their customers, according to Landon Godfrey, director of hospital operations.
Godfrey, a pharmacist who worked in the hospital’s retail pharmacy before becoming director of operations, is excited that pharmacists Dawn Garrick, Lori Morin and Ernie Ratzburg will be working at Providence’s new location. Garrick, a former employee of Health Care Plus, has been a pharmacist for 15 years and puts extra focus on the elderly. Ratzburg is a longtime Polson pharmacist and Morin has been a University of Montana faculty member since Godfrey was a student, Godfrey said.
The new location will offer compounding services not available commercially. For example, the pharmacists will be able to add pain medications to lotions for direct application onto a painful knee, or reduce a medication down to an appropriate children’s dosage, according to Godfrey.
People choose a pharmacy for its convenience of location and prices, he said.
“The reason people typically choose our pharmacy is we have generally the lowest pharmacy prices,” Godfrey said, adding that because they are part of Providence, the pharmacy gets group purchasing pricing that reduces the cost of brand name pharmaceuticals. And pharmacists have access to St. Joseph patient records while they were hospitalized, offering continuity of care.
“So that’s a benefit to patients who go to our hospital as well,” Godfrey said.
The expansion will also enable Providence to offer a delivery service bring medication to people’s homes.
The move of Health Care Plus pharmacy to Walgreens offers new advantages to their clients, including a handy location, an immunization program, a drive-through window seven days a week and nationwide connections.
“Snowbirds can fill their prescriptions here, then when they are in Arizona, they can pick up at another Walgreens with no hassle,” said Ken Druyvestein, pharmacy manager.
Once a person has all their information set up in the system, and insurance on record, it only takes about 10 minutes to fill a prescription, according to Druyvestein.
Walgreens pharmacy is open 9 a.m. to 9 p.m., Monday through Friday, and 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Saturday and Sunday.
“Just pull up and drive through,” he said.
Walgreens also has a phone app for smart phone users. People can log onto the app site, find out what medications they are on and in what amounts, and order refills.
“It’s really slick,” Druyvestein said.
The only thing missing is pharmacist Vicki Siemers, who opened Health Care Plus Pharmacy 27 years ago. At the Super 1 Foods location, she remained the only independent pharmacist in Polson, until July 1.
“I opened HealthCare Plus on July 1st, 1988, so it was a poignant sentiment that we would close July 1st, 2015, exactly 27 years later,” Seimers said. “It has been an honor and a privilege to serve the healthcare needs of our community for those years … I am very proud of our staff at HCP that has transitioned to Walgreens, and I know they will provide the same personal service.”
Siemers and her staff in Polson will continue to provide medical supply and oxygen as well as their medication packaging program for seniors from the HCP location at 7th Avenue and Main Street.
