System for separating and distributing pharmacy order processing for compound medication

• US 20070088567A1
• Filed: 10/18/2005
• Published: 04/19/2007
• Est. Priority Date: 10/18/2005
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Walgreen Co. (Walgreens Boots Alliance Incorporated)
• Original Assignee: Walgreen Co. (Walgreens Boots Alliance Incorporated)
• Inventors: Selka, Gowri, Berkelhamer, Alan
• Granted Patent: US 8,175,891 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 705/2
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/06 Buying, selling or leasing transactions
• CPC Class Codes: G16H 20/10 relating to drugs or medications, e.g. for ensuring correct administration to patients
• CPC Class Codes: G16H 40/20 for the management or administration of healthcare resources or facilities, e.g. managing hospital staff or surgery rooms

Abstract

An information system and method that provides the ability to reroute portions of prescription order work between a plurality of organizational units in order to leverage capacity, expertise, or other resources to increase network efficiency.

Claims

1. A method of managing drug prescription orders within a network of pharmacy resources connected by an information processing system, the method comprising:

creating an original order data (OOD) object containing a set of information received from a customer during placement of a compound drug prescription order;

creating a task object that is associated with the OOD object, wherein the task object stores work associated with the OOD object;

identifying an equipment type indicator associated with the prescription order;

determining an equipment capacity of a pharmacy resource based on the equipment type indicator; and

routing at least one of the OOD object and task object from a first queue associated with a first network computer to a second queue associated with a second network computer based on the equipment capacity, and wherein the first and second network computer are associated with a first and a second pharmacy resource, respectively.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the equipment indicator indicates a compound drug prescription order when the prescription order requires two or more base ingredients to fill.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the equipment capacity is based on at least one of the existence and availability of a set of equipment at a pharmacy resource to process a compound drug prescription.

4. The method of claim 1, further comprising determining a set of pharmacy resources having equipment capacity to process compound drugs.

5. The method of claim 4, wherein determining a set of pharmacy resources having equipment capacity to process compound drugs comprises communicating with a pharmacy network database containing a table of pharmacy resources and compound equipment availability.

6. The method of claim 5, wherein the set of pharmacy resources having a threshold level of equipment capacity are designated as compound centers.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein the second network computer is associated with a compound center.

8. The method of claim 7, further comprising routing at least one of the task object and OOD object to a third queue associated with a mail function.

9. The method of claim 8, wherein the mail function initiates a delivery of the filled compound prescription to a customer location.

10. The method of claim 9, wherein the customer location is a retail store where the prescription order originated.

12. The method of claim 1, wherein the equipment indicator indicates a pet medication prescription order.

13. The method of claim 12, wherein the equipment capacity is based on at least one of the existence and availability of a set of equipment at a pharmacy resource to process a pet medication prescription.

14. A compound drug pharmacy workflow system implemented by a computer system, the system comprising:

an image object associated with a prescription order;

a task object associated with the prescription order, wherein the task object comprises an equipment type parameter indicating a compound drug value; and

a first workflow manager that determines a first set of pharmacy network facilities having equipment capacity to process a compound drug prescription, and wherein the workflow manager routes at least one of the image object and the task object to a queue associated with one of the first set of pharmacy network facilities.

15. The system of claim 14, wherein the equipment capacity is based on at least one of the existence and availability of compound drug equipment at the pharmacy network facility.

16. The system of claim 15, wherein the workflow manager further determines a second set of pharmacy network facilities matching a selection criteria, wherein the second set is a subset of the first set of pharmacy network facilities.

17. The system of claim 16, wherein the selection criteria comprises at least one of a pharmacy resource workload, a proximity to a pharmacy resource, and a customer pickup preference.

18. The system of claim 17, wherein the workflow manager executes a display function on a first network computer, wherein the display function lists the second set of pharmacy network facilities.

19. The system of claim 18, wherein the function lists the first set of pharmacy network facilities when a parameter is set by the first network computer in response to a customer inquiry.

20. A computer-readable medium having computer-executable instructions for providing a compound drug prescription order workflow, comprising:

a first program that receives original order data and creates an original order data object;

a second program that creates a task object and associates the task object with the original order data object;

a third program that identifies a specialty equipment indicator associated with the task object; and

a fourth program that routes the task object and one of the original order data object and a reference to the original order data object from a queue associated with a first network computer to a queue associated with a second network computer based on the specialty equipment indicator.