Bridging Pharmacy Deserts: Enhancing Entry By Expertise and Collaboration

A quiet emergency is taking form throughout America’s well being care panorama, one outlined not by new illnesses, however by disappearing entry. Pharmacy deserts are an escalating public well being disaster within the US. Almost 46% of US counties lack handy pharmacy entry, leaving over 16 million People with out close by choices for important medicines. This entry hole displays a deeper inflection level: the standard retail pharmacy mannequin is not sustainable in lots of communities, pushing well being care suppliers and know-how companions to rethink how and the place care is delivered.

As main retail pharmacy chains shutter 1000’s of shops, folks in affected areas should journey over an hour to get prescriptions, vaccines, or primary well being care wants. These closures are attributable to a mix of monetary strain, business consolidation, and altering shopper expectations, all of which creates an ideal storm that would go away tens of millions of individuals behind.

This rising inaccessibility has a tangible value. Medicine nonadherence, usually pushed by lack of pharmacy entry, provides $290 billion yearly in avoidable healthcare bills, together with $100 billion in preventable hospitalizations.³ Rising drug prices and fragmented care coordination at the moment are the main forces behind declining adherence, intensifying disparities in continual illness administration and preventive care. When sufferers can’t entry or refill prescriptions simply, the results ripple throughout the healthcare system, resulting in poorer outcomes and better prices.

Expertise: Bridging the Accessibility and Care Hole

Digital innovation is important to reversing this pattern. Telepharmacy, cellular pharmacy apps, and synthetic intelligence (AI)-enabled shelling out can dramatically lengthen attain, bringing pharmacists to sufferers nearly, 24/7. An evaluation by Accenture reveals telehealth visits at the moment are 38 instances greater than prepandemic ranges, demonstrating that sufferers are prepared for digital engagement.⁴

In the meantime, 50% of OTC gross sales are projected to happen on-line throughout the subsequent 3 to 4 years, and cellular pharmacy purchases are rising at a 19% compound annual progress price by 2026. These shifts, together with residence supply, provide a blueprint for equitable entry past bodily areas. But know-how alone isn’t the reply. Its influence is dependent upon how suppliers combine digital instruments into care coordination and affected person engagement fashions.

Reimagining Pharmacies as Frontline Care Hubs

For the pharmacies that stay, they have to evolve from the final line of protection to the entrance line of care. Integrating pharmacies earlier within the care journey and connecting sufferers, payers, suppliers, and pharmacists creates a unified ecosystem that helps adherence and preventive well being. Analysis reveals that sufferers who obtain pharmacy-based medical interventions have 3% greater treatment adherence and a pair of.7% fewer emergency visits than those that don’t.³

For suppliers, stepping straight into pharmacy entry gives each necessity and alternative. As value-based care expands, suppliers are more and more accountable for outcomes that hinge on treatment adherence. Direct partnerships, and even owned digital pharmacy fashions, permit them to shut last-mile entry gaps, scale back readmissions, and ship steady care exterior conventional settings.

By increasing pharmacists’ roles to incorporate providers akin to continual illness monitoring, vaccinations, and drugs remedy administration, we will construct stronger, value-based care fashions rooted in accessibility and belief.

Feeding the Urge for food for Change

Any such change requires collaboration between suppliers, pharmacists, and know-how innovators. Encouragingly, Accenture analysis reveals practically 80% of US adults say they’re keen to share knowledge inside related well being programs to realize higher entry and coordinated experiences.⁵ The urgency is evident: Entry is declining quickest the place social determinants already pressure well being fairness. Suppliers who act now can redefine their function not solely as caregivers but in addition as enablers of constant, reasonably priced entry to treatment.

In the end, pharmacy deserts are a symptom of systemic fragmentation, and the treatment lies in coordinated, technology-enabled care fashions that meet sufferers the place they’re. By reworking pharmacies into digital-first well being entry factors, we will bridge gaps, enhance outcomes, and construct a more healthy, extra equitable future for all.

REFERENCES

1. Research finds 46 p.c of US counties have pharmacy deserts. Information launch. Nationwide Group Pharmacists Affiliation. August 28, 2024. Accessed December 8, 2025. https://www.ncpa.org/newsroom/qam/2024/08/28/study-finds-46-percent-us-counties-have-pharmacy-deserts

2. Nowosielski B. Pharmacy deserts outstanding in areas of excessive social vulnerability. Drug Subjects. August 23, 2024. Accessed December 8, 2025. https://www.drugtopics.com/view/pharmacy-deserts-prominent-in-areas-of-high-social-vulnerability

3. Kwan N. The influence of pharmacy deserts. US Pharm. 2024;49(4):32-36.

4. Bestesennyy O, Gilbert G, Harris A, Rost J. Telehealth: a quarter-trillion-dollar post-COVID-19 actuality? McKinsey & Firm. July 9, 2021. Accessed December 8, 2025. https://www.mckinsey.com/industries/healthcare/our-insights/telehealth-a-quarter-trillion-dollar-post-covid-19-reality

5. Accenture research finds rising demand for digital well being providers revolutionizing supply fashions: sufferers, docs + machines. Information launch. Accenture. March 6, 2018. Accessed December 8, 2025. https://newsroom.accenture.com/information/2018/accenture-study-finds-growing-demand-for-digital-health-services-revolutionizing-delivery-models-patients-doctors-machines