Walgreens announced Thursday that it would work directly with drugmakers to bring cell and gene therapies to U.S. patients as a part of a broader expansion Services of a specialty pharmacy.
The company announced that it’s establishing a brand new business unit for its specialty pharmacy segment, which can include a specialty pharmacy subsidiary AllianceRx. The unit will likely be a part of the core business of the US pharmacy retail division. In the meantime, Shields Health Solutionsa subsidiary that supports specialty pharmacies owned by the health system will remain under Walgreens' U.S. health care division.
Specialty pharmacies have turn into a significant player within the U.S. healthcare system, particularly in terms of chronic diseases turn into more common.
Specialty pharmacies offer medications that require extreme care in handling, storage, and distribution. Treatments are sometimes geared toward patients with chronic, rare or complex diseases equivalent to cancer, Crohn's disease and HIV. Specialty pharmacies also offer counseling or financial assistance to assist patients with these costly treatments.
The company's latest investments to “transform” its specialty pharmacy services include the opening of a newly licensed facility in Pittsburgh specializing in cell and gene therapy services. The 18,000 square meter center will help drug manufacturers and healthcare providers, amongst others, navigate the complex supply chain for these treatments and manage patient needs.
Walgreens' decision to launch cell and gene therapy services comes after a surge in approvals of those drugs within the U.S. and European Union last 12 months. They are one-off, cost-intensive treatments that focus on a patient's genetic source or cell to cure or significantly alter the course of a disease. Some health experts expect cell and gene therapies to switch the normal lifelong treatments that individuals use to treat chronic diseases.
The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved seven cell and gene therapies last 12 months, including the primary gene therapies to treat sickle cell disease. This market is just expected to grow: the FDA has done so predicted that it would review and approve between 10 and 20 cell and gene therapies yearly by 2025.
Walgreens said its newly formed unit can be the most important independent provider of specialty pharmacy services, with sales of about $24 billion within the segment. The Walgreens Specialty Pharmacy store isn’t affiliated with a pharmacy profit manager. the corporate noted.
That gives the corporate “the flexibility to dynamically contract with any payer,” Walgreens Chief Pharmacy Officer Rick Gates said in the discharge. “We can work directly with pharmaceutical manufacturers to facilitate the launch of products, including drugs with limited distribution, and coordinate closely with providers to ensure patients experience a smooth start to treatment.”
Under the brand new entity, patients at AllianceRx and the corporate's nearly 300 community-based pharmacies will now have access to resources that “build on the expert care they already receive from their specialty pharmacist,” Walgreens said in the discharge. These include clinicians with key disease expertise, nutritionists and nurses.
The company said they’re community-based specialty pharmacies are positioned near medical office buildings and health systems and offer specialty medications “faster than industry average” in addition to services equivalent to injection training and side effect management.
Walgreens said that was the case greater than 1,500 specialty pharmacists, 5,000 patient support team members, and an unspecified variety of dedicated specialty pharmacy teams.
In addition, the corporate offers greater than 1,300 specialty medicines, including 240 “limited distribution” medicines to which only a couple of specialty pharmacies have access.
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