2021 Pharmacy Wrap Up

A massive year of vaccinations

Pharmacists across Australia were run off their feet with the rollout of COVID-19 vaccinations. Over 1.6 million COVID-19 vaccinations have been recorded in PlusOne, that's an average of 770 vaccinations per pharmacy. This is on top of the 660,000 flu vaccinations delivered throughout the year.

Vaccinations in pharmacy will no doubt continue to grow as people become eligible for their COVID-19 booster dose, and co-administration with flu vaccine commences from March 2023.

We hope the COVID-19 related features that we rolled out in 2021, including

• AIR lookup
• PPA claiming
• online bookings
• pre-screening forms and more,

have helped to save you time and streamline your workflow processes.

If you have any feedback please click here and complete the survey to help us understand.

We have put many initiatives on hold this year while we focused on supporting COVID-19 vaccination requirements. We look forward to progressing these other exciting initiatives in 2022 – including the rollout of version 6 of the MedAdvisor App. More information to come shortly.

eScript ramp up

Covid has led to a rapid acceleration of digital transformation in healthcare. In particular, eScripts has shown strong growth since the national rollout 12 months ago.

Almost 1 million eScripts have been ordered via the MedAdvisor App, with the graph below highlighting the growth that will undoubtedly continue.

We've received great feedback about how useful the MedAdvisor App is for helping patients manage and order eScript tokens. Importantly for pharmacy, the app ensures loyalty in the absence of paper scripts on file.

My advice is to ensure any patient who presents with an eScript is signed up to the App.

Strong growth in online ordering

There has also been strong growth in online shopping, with 27% increase in online purchases in September 2021 compared to same period in 2020 (October 2021 eCommerce Insights, AusPost).

This trend was reflected in MedAdvisor App ordering. In fact, there was a 50% increase in orders in September 2021 compared to the same period in 2020. There was also strong growth for in-app payments (aka Pay in Advance) over the past 12 months.

For those pharmacies that have this feature enabled, 28% of orders are being paid for within the App, with an average basket value of $36.30.

We will be working on exciting new initiatives in 2022 that will drive further increases in app orders. Stay tuned!

Recognising excellence in pharmacy

Last but not least, I’d like to congratulate the pharmacies in our network who received a Certificate of Excellence for their outstanding performance in 2021 with patient sign ups and professional services. It's been 2 years since we launched our recognition program, with

• 145 pharmacies achieving Platinum status (more than 1,000 App sign ups and 1,000 professional services recorded in PlusOne),
• 424 pharmacies achieving Gold status (more than 500 App sign ups and 500 professional services recorded in PlusOne), and
• 798 pharmacies achieving Silver status (more than 250 App sign ups and 250 professional services recorded in PlusOne).

The pandemic has really highlighted the value of community pharmacy, and we are proud to be working together with such an amazing industry.

MedAdvisor receives Pharmacists' Choice award