CVS Health, one of the nation’s biggest operators of retail chain pharmacies, will pay Ohio $1.5 million in fines for concerns mostly linked to understaffing and make improvements that may soon be obligatory for all the state’s retail pharmacies, the Ohio Board of Pharmacy announced Thursday.
The fines, the heaviest ever issued by the state board, are part of the settlement of 27 safety issues the agency was investigating at 22 CVS locations.
The 27 complaints asserted several safety problems and probable legal infractions identified during a series of inspections of those businesses between 2020 and 2023 and determined that understaffing contributed substantially to many of the issues.
Inspectors discovered inadequate personnel for the number of prescriptions, dispensing mistakes, prescription delays, unclean equipment, garbage throughout the pharmacies, outdated pharmaceuticals, poor drug security, and failure to disclose losses of restricted substances, among other concerns.
“By entering into this settlement agreement, the Board seeks immediate and systemic changes to protect patients and address critical understaffing,” stated Steven Schierholt, executive director of the State of Ohio Board of Pharmacy. “We believe that this agreement is an acknowledgement by CVS that considerable changes are warranted to ensure the safe practice of pharmacy at their retail stores.”
The deal includes the unprecedented step of putting the eight locations with the worst personnel difficulties under “advanced monitoring” by the board, to be financed by CVS, for the next three years. CVS also committed to voluntarily complying with certain not-yet-finalized state standards focusing on patient safety. Those include introducing required rest intervals, providing medicines within three days or less, and developing a method for workers to warn management about understaffing.
The proposed state standards CVS agreed to adopt may soon apply to all pharmacies in the state, as the board expects them to be completed within the next several months.
CVS Health has more than 9,000 retail outlets nationwide and is the biggest U.S. pharmacy by revenue. It is the biggest operator of retail pharmacies in Ohio. Spokesperson Amy Thibault said that CVS is “pleased to have reached an agreement with the Ohio Board of Pharmacy regarding years-old allegations involving some of our Ohio pharmacies” and that the company looks forward to working with the board, including on “enhancing our positive identification systems and continuing to provide safe, high-quality pharmacy care to our patients.”
Employees at retail chain pharmacies have been raising the alarm about patient and workplace safety risks connected to understaffing for years. Profit margins for retail pharmacies started decreasing more than a decade ago, placing stress on the business. Workers claim staffing shortages exacerbated throughout the pandemic while work duties expanded, leading to pharmaceutical delays and increasing the chance of errors, such as miscounting or picking the incorrect drug while filling prescriptions.
In response to staffing issues, in the last few years, CVS and other retail pharmacy firms have undertaken big recruiting campaigns, increased compensation, and even done away with certain measures. Outcry from workers, who are primarily nonunionized, has persisted, including several work stoppages at retail chains in the autumn.
“We’re committed to ensuring there are appropriate levels of staffing and resources at our pharmacies and are making targeted investments,” Thibault added. That includes boosting pharmacist pay to nearly $1 billion between 2021 and 2024 and offering around $70 million in incentives this year to “pharmacists, pharmacy technicians, and other frontline colleagues.”
Pharmacy errors may vary from tiny mistakes, like miscounting the number of pills in a container, to potentially catastrophic ones, like missing a harmful medication interaction. Pharmacy processes contain checks to avoid and spot such mistakes, but as pharmacists and technicians grow more busy, the more likely they are to make and overlook errors, pharmacy experts say, sparking worries from state regulators.
At one Ohio location, state inspectors observed the pharmacy would “close intermittently due to understaffing,” preventing patients from obtaining their drugs. At another, inspectors noticed that “although the pharmacy is closed for lunch, staff rarely stop to take a break or eat because they are so far behind.” Both inspections happened in 2022.
Several state pharmacy boards, which oversee pharmacies, including those in Ohio, have punished retail chain pharmacies for understaffing concerns in recent years. The Ohio board’s Thursday settlement represents the greatest number of pharmacies and biggest monetary sanction ever connected to staffing in the state, maybe nationally, board spokeswoman Cameron McNamee said.
Ohio resolved its 27 claims with CVS for a $1.25 million penalty. As part of the deal, the eight locations where the board discovered the largest staffing difficulties were put on a three-year probation, and the corporation would pay an extra $250,000 “to cover the cost of enhanced monitoring by the Board.”
NEWS SOURCE: NBC NEWS
