SHELF OBSESSED

Pharmacy shelving, often overlooked for its importance in creating the basic working environment within your drug store, plays a different and unique role in both the front and back ends of your business space. Pharmacies, by their very nature, have unique shelving and fixture requirements that differ depending on where in the store they're installed. Back end pharmacy shelving needs to be concerned with easy access for workers to reach essential supplies to promote an efficient workflow. It also must provide needed security, prodigious storage space and, in some areas, a sterile space for compounding medications.

Privacy requirements governing the use of PHI (protected health information) have become extremely stringent, especially since the 2013 Final Omnibus Rule Update to the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA). The rules regarding the security and privacy of health information and data are not only now being much more tightly enforced, but penalties for breaching these standards are significant, carrying fines of up to 1.5 million dollars.

As a pharmacy owner or manager, improving the safety and security of your pharmacy is a topic that should be of continual concern and something that is affected by nearly every aspect of your pharmacy design. From the doors and windows that present potential entryways for after-hours would-be intruders to the safe storage of narcotics in the dispensing area, safety and security must remain of prime importance. Ensuring the safety of patients coming to you to have their prescriptions filled is also a main area of concern, not only from the standpoint of guarding against dispensing errors but also having the necessary information to preclude any potential adverse drug interactions.

Creative retail display is an art. With it, you can showcase your products so that customers will be drawn to them and want to buy them. Your retail displays should generally be near store areas that see regular foot traffic, so that customers will be "in the flow" of shopping, walk by, and buy. They should also be attention-grabbing, since simple displays can often blend into the background so that customers won't even see them. And finally, they should be set up so that customers can access products easily.

Gondola shelving has long been the mainstay of retail – a familiar sight in almost every type of establishment, from the local grocery store to the corner pharmacy, from the designer shops to the big box bargain outlets and dollar stores. It is the strong, versatile, and indispensable workhorse that no store can do without – a fact that often doesn't please retailers with the goal of standing out from the crowd. However, using gondola fixtures doesn't mean your independent pharmacy has to look like a smaller version of that corporate chain store down the road.      

Since a long-term care pharmacy is a type of closed door establishment, the facility’s design is unconcerned with catering to retail customers. That’s not to say there are no clients – it’s just that the ones you deal with aren't retail buyers. Rather, your clients are the doctors and other medical personnel responsible for the care of patients for whom you are providing prescriptions and other medications.