For years, getting prescriptions in Unalaska meant waiting for the mail or getting only about 10 days’ worth at the Iliuliuk Family and Health Services clinic’s dispensary. The island has no pharmacist.
Now there’s a place on-island to fill a full prescription, often the same day. The clinic is running the island’s first pharmacy, which is already filling prescriptions during a soft opening.
“I think people are going to be pleasantly surprised at how much easier it’s going to make their lives,” said Christy Fassbender, a medical provider at the clinic.
She said anyone with a prescription can use the clinic’s new pharmacy — like out-of-state fishermen who forget their medication at home and residents who rely on refrigerated drugs.
Insulin, for instance, can spoil if it gets too warm or too cold during shipping. When that happens, patients have to wait even longer to get the medication they need.
“Having the pharmacy here will eliminate that process of the waiting,” Fassbender said. “The medication will be at the correct temperature the entire time, and they can just come in and get their medication instead of waiting a week, two weeks.”
The pharmacy contracts with a pharmacist group in Soldotna. Technicians fill prescriptions on-site, and the pharmacists supervise them through cameras.
“When a patient comes in, gets a prescription filled, any consult that needs to be done with the pharmacist is done through a screen, like a FaceTime kind of thing,” said Dawn Johnson, CEO of Iliuliuk Family and Health Services.
The clinic was awarded $400,282 for the pharmacy from the federal Rural Health Transformation Program, which Congress passed last year to improve rural health care across the country. The money covers startup costs, like renovating the space, setting up the telepharmacy technology, and training staff.
Johnson said the project took about a year and a half.
“It’s been a lot of work and a lot of administrative work from us to get everything in place that we needed,” she said. “But again, the benefit far outweighs the cost.”
The pharmacy is inside the clinic’s main entrance, next to the staircase. Its current stock is based on the past year of prescriptions written at the clinic. The pharmacy will keep regularly prescribed medications in stock, and medications not on the shelf can usually be ordered.
Unlike the old dispensary, the pharmacy bills insurance, and patients pay at pickup. The clinic is still signing contracts with insurance companies, which is part of why it’s calling this a soft opening. A grand opening is tentatively planned for Nov. 14.
For any pharmacy questions, call the clinic at 907-581-1202.
