What inspired you to start Charac?
I founded Charac due to the issues I was facing as a diabetic. It is surprisingly hard for patients to keep track of their prescriptions, and when your life depends on the accessibility of a medication, not being able to monitor prescriptions is an added worry. I was entirely reliant on calling my pharmacist to order and track prescriptions, and wanted to rectify this.
With my background in entrepreneurial technology, it made sense to push for a solution to empower both patients and pharmacies to have greater clarity and control. What better way than to create a system that gives pharmacists and patients full access to their records of repeat medications, at any time?
What issues are pharmacies facing right now?
Over 400 pharmacies closed between 2020 and 2022 [1] with pharmacies suffering an annual shortfall of £67,500 [2] due to insufficient government funding. Inflation is further impacting pharmacies, with the cost of many antibiotics rising by more than ten times at the end of last year. For example, suppliers went from charging pharmacies £1.30 for a bottle of penicillin at the start of 2022 to £14.95 by the end of the year [3]
Pharmacies are lacking the money to be able to maintain their services through these headwinds. This is not the only issue pharmacies face and, as pressures across the healthcare sector have been rising, pharmacists have struggled to have the time to provide key services.
But, pharmacies can play a vital role in assisting the health service by providing services such as prescriptions and consultations, freeing up overburdened GPs. However, Charac has found that 40% of phone calls to pharmacies are due to a lack of clarity about prescriptions between pharmacists and patients, much like how I required updates on my prescriptions for diabetes.
Pharmacists therefore do not have the capacity to conduct services that could help boost revenue, such as the New Medicine Service (NMS) - a scheme that encourages pharmacies to follow up with patients when using specific new medications, pharmacies are then paid when these follow-up reviews are conducted. Furthermore, pharmacists are unable to prove that they have conducted these services, as they lack the sufficient technology for a quality digital record keeping platform.
If pharmacies are unable to provide ease of access and information, pharmacists become bogged down with unnecessary additional work. This has knock-on effects on the income of pharmacies, and even impacts the level of assistance pharmacies are able to provide to the NHS.
How is digitalisation transforming the healthcare sector?
The technological infancy of the healthcare sector has left pharmacies unable to meet the demands of patients. However, digitising processes is already helping pharmacies adapt to patients' needs.
Online pharmacies now provide competition for traditional pharmacies, by being more accessible and efficient for patients who can order medication directly from and to their doorstep. The increased popularity of online pharmacies is showing the importance of evolving the healthcare sector as technology provides new ways to simplify and improve services.
However, there are still challenges here. For instance, online pharmacies lack the personalised element of visiting high street pharmacies, where patients can interact with healthcare professionals for advice. There is still very much a place for traditional pharmacies - if empowered to provide online services, pharmacies will be able to deliver medications and offer crucial consultations to patients, acting as a bridge before patients seek out care from GPs.
What is Charac doing to help pharmacies?
Through its cutting-edge, NHS-integrated, digital platform and app, Charac is addressing the pressures placed on pharmacies and the NHS. These tools give independent community pharmacies a digital presence, greatly improving customers' access to nearby pharmacies and streamlining the ordering and access of prescription drugs, relieving pressure from overworked pharmacy leaders.
By improving the online presence of pharmacies, Charac allows pharmacists more time to work on services that increase revenue, while also providing digital marketing services such as advertising, white-label branding, and website creation that can promote the services that commuNHSnity pharmacies provide.
Platforms like Charac will be essential for addressing important issues like personnel shortages, as well as helping with the pressures faced by the NHS. These platforms are becoming more widely recognised as a digital remedy to the burden that pharmacists are under, with Charac's partnership with the NPA and a recent £1 million investment by Royal Mail evidence of this.
The future of pharmacies is in our hands - it's time to unleash their full potential.