Hy-Vee-owned Specialty Pharmacy Leads in Patient Satisfaction: Survey

A recent survey conducted by Livingston, N.J.-based Zitter Health Insights has found that Amber Pharmacy, a wholly owned subsidiary of Hy-Vee, Inc., ranks the highest out of all specialty pharmacies in the United States in the area of patient satisfaction with pharmacy employees.

Assessing various aspects of patient satisfaction and garnering responses from more than 3,000 patients of 38 American specialty pharmacies, the survey enables specialty pharmacies to objectively assess how they’re perceived by their patients as well, as how they compare in terms of competitor performance. Amber Pharmacy’s pharmacists, nurses, pharmacy technicians and billing department scored 100 percent, while its customer service representatives received 95 percent.

“At Amber Pharmacy, we live our company values of integrity, compassion, reliability and respect every day,” said Aaron Wiese, president of the Omaha, Neb.-based subsidiary. “These results further demonstrate our focus on patient-centered care.”

One key component of the survey, the Net Promoter Score (NPS) measures on a 1-to100 scale patients’ willingness to recommend a pharmacy to others. Amber Pharmacy’s NPS across all categories was 74, the second-highest of all pharmacies assessed and 23 points higher than the average of all specialty pharmacies evaluated in the survey.

To determine the NPS, patients were specifically asked on a scale of 0 to 10 how likely they would be to recommend Amber Pharmacy to a friend or family member. Around 65 percent of patients rated Amber Pharmacy a 10, and 17 percent of patients gave Amber Pharmacy a 9, resulting in a total of 82 percent of patients giving Amber Pharmacy the highest rating possible.

In the individual therapeutic categories, Amber Pharmacy led the transplant category with an NPS of 83, and was among the top two pharmacies in the oncology and rheumatoid arthritis categories.

Zitter’s survey was conducted between Aug. 1 and Oct. 24.

West Des Moines, Iowa-based Hy-Vee Inc. operates more than 240 stores in eight Midwestern states: Iowa, Illinois, Missouri, Kansas, Nebraska, South Dakota, Minnesota and Wisconsin.