Workforce Management‘s Jeremy Smerd on employers’ emerging approaches to integration of clinics – onsite and/or retail – to their health strategies. Good stuff:
Work-Site Clinics Gain Favor as Retail Sites Lag (February 2010; free registration required)
The wide presence of Take Care’s clinics among employers in New York shows how Walgreens has aggressively tapped into the growing market for work-site medical clinics as part of its effort to rebrand itself as a health and wellness company. Analysts say the move makes sense….
Retail clinics and work-site medical clinics are thought to be complementary, offering different services for different populations….
But growth in retail clinics has stagnated….
Walgreens, meanwhile, has been quick to focus on work-site clinics. In 2007, Walgreens bought Take Care Health Systems, then a retail-based clinic, and the next year acquired two of the largest work-site clinic companies in the country, CHD Meridian Healthcare and Whole Health Management….
For now, Take Care remains the largest company in the fast-growing market for work-site medical clinics. The percentage of employers providing on-site health clinics increased tenfold from 1 percent in 2008 to 10 percent in 2009….
Count us among those who think retail and worksite clinics are complementary – and see the end of this post for at least one management team that also appears to do so.
We’ve commented elsewhere on Brian Klepper‘s February 2010 onsite clinics assessment checklist for Workforce Management, but wanted to include references to both under this topic title (Brian is quoted in the previously cited Workforce Management article). Because we’re here for you, dear reader.
Finally, we’re including this brief 3/1/10 Illinois Daily Herald report on Walgreens recent restructuring announcement (free registration may be required). The restructuring moves management of the pharmacy-benefits services business under Take Care Health founder Hal F. Rosenbluth, “along with workplace and retail clinics”. We’re not yet sure how, but we feel this may be relevant to the onsite/retail clinics strategy dynamic.
EDIT 3/8/10: o-kaaaayyyy, that last story is getting some real attention – here’s a link to Drug Store News’ account, with commentary: Integrating Health Solutions for Payers, Walgreens Unifies Pharmacy, Wellness, Led by Crawford (free registration may be required)
….At its essence, the restructuring is an attempt by Walgreens to integrate and bring to bear all of its more than 8,000 “points of care,” on behalf of employers, government and managed care….The result, according to [Walgreens CEO Greg] Wasson, will be “a unified offering to payers in the healthcare marketplace,” as well as “increased efficiencies across Walgreens’ pharmacy, health and wellness operations.