As news emerged about the positive COVID-19 vaccine trial results from Pfizer and its German partner BioNTech, the attention turned to how the vaccine would be distributed and administered to 330 million Americans. EnlivenHealth™ explored these COVID-19 vaccine readiness issues in a recent national survey1 conducted with retail pharmacies and health plans.
One of the leading takeaways from the survey was that 67% of pharmacies and 99% of health plans are either “very concerned” or “somewhat concerned” about people’s willingness to take the COVID-19 vaccine once it is available. In addition, responding to the pandemic, 77% of pharmacies surveyed said they would either be adopting or expanding year-round vaccination strategies.
How the forthcoming COVID-19 vaccine will be paid for was also addressed in the EnlivenHealth™ survey. Some 95% of the health plans who responded to the survey said they would treat the vaccine as preventative care under the Affordable Care Act. In addition, 90% of these health plans believe the COVID-19 vaccine will be covered with a $0 copay, while 73% view the upcoming vaccine as both a medical and pharmacy benefit.
Other major findings of the EnlivenHealth™ COVID-19 Vaccine Readiness Survey, include:
- 88% of pharmacies and 69% of health plans will risk stratify their populations to determine who receives the COVID-19 vaccine first.
- 69% of pharmacies and 86% of health plans intend to undertake marketing and educational programs to inform their patients/members on the importance of getting the vaccine.
- 90% of health plans stated they would not require any prior approval before a member can receive the COVID-19 vaccine.
- 81% of health plans stated they would work with pharmacies to administer the COVID-19 vaccine.
As a leading provider of patient engagement and communications technology solutions for retail pharmacies and health plans, EnlivenHealth™ is helping pharmacies to effectively manage the COVID-19 vaccine with its recent launch of CareScheduler, a software as a service technology solution. CareScheduler enables hands-free scheduling and vaccine registry reporting for the eventual COVID-19 vaccine. Integrated into EnlivenHealth’s industry-leading Patient Engagement Platform, CareScheduler automates the collection of consent and vaccine administration records without patients having to handle documents in the pharmacy.
CareScheduler eliminates the need for signing physical pieces of paper and minimizes the time patients spend in the pharmacy, greatly reducing infection risk for patients and staff. Given these important benefits, it’s expected that CareScheduler will help allay the concerns of some patients about visiting the pharmacy to get vaccinated for COVID-19.
For more information on the CareScheduler vaccine readiness solution, click here.
1Based on survey sampling of EnlivenHealthTM retail pharmacy and health plan partners. Results are intended to provide relevant and independent information as to pharmacies’ and health plans’ expectations with respect to COVID-19 readiness. EnlivenHealth™ does not maintain or represent that the information, analyses and/or conclusions necessarily reflect the perspectives of all pharmacies and health plans, and/or the complete market of those involved with COVID-19 readiness.