By integrating technology throughout the operation, Symbria’s pharmacies package a high volume of medication while enjoying productivity gains and cultivating customer loyalty.
Symbria Rx Services in Warrenville, Illinois, is a pharmacy serving long-term care, skilled nursing, and assisted living facilities in multiple states. They knew to be a leader in this challenging and growing market, they would need state-of-the-art technology. That’s why they turned to Parata.
“Over 90 percent of our operation is automated,” estimates Derek Brown, Symbria’s director of operations. Parata technology enables Symbria to keep patients well, streamline production, reduce errors, and empower pharmacists to engage in higher-level clinical support. By integrating technology throughout the operation, Symbria’s pharmacies package a high volume of medication while enjoying productivity gains and cultivating customer loyalty.
Symbria’s six pharmacies dispense 70,000 scripts each month. That’s about 42,000 medication pouches each day. Derek and his team rely on three PASS 500 units for pouch packaging and Parata Perl with Transport for each day’s verification — which it handles with ease.
The benefits of automation extend beyond Symbria’s pharmacies. Medication management is important to Symbria’s clients because it’s vital to resident satisfaction and health. And academic research bears this out:
- A study from Easton Hospital/Drexel University noted that adverse drug events harm 7 million people, lead to more than one million emergency room visits, and cost almost $21 million each year.
- Researchers at the University of Wollongong found that nurses in skilled nursing facilities spent a fifth of their day in medication-related activities.
Symbria pharmacist with clipboard
Symbria is committed to helping LTC facilities mitigate medication errors, improve medication management and compliance, and improve resident satisfaction. And do it all at scale and on schedule.
Strip packaging – produced with Parata technology – supports medication adherence and management in all settings and produces valuable process improvements. In fact, a Symbria research summary confirms that strip packaging is more efficient and less time-intensive for med pass. Pouches:
- Save 44 seconds per patient
- Reduce med passes 6 minutes per 15 residents
- Equal more than 36 hours or one nurse week a year
The result? Freeing nursing staff to focus on “should do” activities related to real patient care — tasks that propel patient outcomes and drive staff satisfaction. These enhancements also improve resident satisfaction and community marketability for the facility.
In addition, Symbria’s highly trained staff now has more time for valuable, high-touch activities requiring their expertise and knowledge. “They’re our highest-paid employees, so any reduction in the time they spend is a win,” Derek adds. “It gives them more time to do the things they went to school for, like assisting communities and making clinical decisions.”
Symbria pharmacist and technician review medications