Who you gonna call?

800-662-HELP is the number, but you rarely hear it. It’s the number of the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration — the people to call for addiction help. But researchers found that the number is hardly ever publicized*, especially compared to the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline number.

(Georgia pharmacists and technicians who need help with addiction can call the PharmAssist Recovery Network at (404) 558-1983, any time day or night.)

* The exception? When a celebrity overdoses

Dogs can be trained to smell hypoglycemia

Yep, you read that right. Trained “glycaemia alert dogs” can tell their diabetic owners when the owner’s blood sugar goes out of range.

The dogs weren’t perfectly accurate, and the data are still preliminary, but…

When asked to recall the incidence of hypoglycaemia, currently and before having a trained dog, all clients reported a reduction in either frequency of low blood sugar, unconscious episodes or paramedic call outs and six clients believed all three had been reduced. Eight people reported that they had never been unconscious since having a trained dog (although they had previously), whilst three reported paramedic call outs pre- but not post-dog acquisition.

The price of independence

Adam Fein at Drug Channels looked at the info in the recent 2018 National Community Pharmacists Association Digest [link] as part of his annual review of pharmacy economics. He did not find good news for indy pharmacists.

[W]e estimate that in 2017, the average pharmacy owner’s salary fell to a level comparable to that of an employed pharmacist. Owning a pharmacy, with all of its hassles and additional obligations, now brings the same reward as being an employee.

That’s a big reason to work towards expanding your healthcare offerings: medication therapy management, diabetes monitoring and education, promoting immunization, joining community-pharmacy networks … you get the idea.

Georgia Tech creating long-term contraceptive patch

Georgia Tech researchers have developed a long-acting, self-administered contraceptive patch. What’s the big deal? The “self-administered” part. If it leaves the lab, the microneedle patch would give women the option of long-term birth control without having to visit a doctor for an injection or an implanted device.

Quick, find a cure!

In the movies, developing a cure for the Deadly Disease That Will Soon Wipeout Mankind can take only hours: “Now that we have a sample of the virus, we can create a vaccine!”

Reality? It doesn’t work that way. But the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations — funded in part by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation — just gave $10.6 million to the University of Queensland “to develop a ‘molecular clamp’ vaccine platform.”

A what? It’s a technology that enables “targeted and rapid vaccine production against multiple viral pathogens.” In other words, a step towards creating vaccines quickly when a new pathogen is discovered … or starts to spread.

The polite term is “mislead”

Turns out that the Sackler family, owner of OxyContin-maker Purdue Pharmaceutical, may have been much more involved in the marketing of Oxycontin than it admitted. In fact, according to court filings…

…one of them, Richard Sackler, advised pushing blame onto people who had become addicted.

“We have to hammer on abusers in every way possible,” Mr. Sackler wrote in an email in 2001, when he was president of the company, Purdue Pharma. “They are the culprits and the problem. They are reckless criminals.”

ICYMI: Walmart won’t accept Caremark

Walmart pharmacies will no longer accept prescription drug coverage from CVS Caremark because the two companies can’t agree on pricing.

You know this is gonna confuse the heck out of a lot of patients. They’re about to learn A) what a PBM is, and B) that CVS pharmacies and CVS Health are two different things.

Caremark controls about 25 percent of the prescription-drug-coverage market, just behind Express Scripts.

Quick follow-up, South Carolina style

Yesterday we mentioned that the Georgia legislature may consider allowing farmers to grow hemp (not marijuana!). South Carolina Pharmacy Association CEO Craig Burridge wrote to point out a cool fact about the plant: “It’s a great rotational crop as well. It’s a plant that actually puts more nitrogen onto the soil than it takes out, and that’s good for other crops.”

To keep our lawyer from having a fit: GPhA has no official stance on the legalization of hemp growing. We just thought it was an interesting tidbit.

Elsewhere: Birth control in Arkansas

A bill introduced by a Republican representative in Arkansas would allow pharmacists there to dispense oral contraceptives without a prescription. Arkansas, you see, has the highest rate of teen pregnancy in the nation, although the bill would only allow OTC birth control for women 18 and older.