Susan Cantrell: Uncertainty Is Affecting Everyone in Healthcare

With a new administration in the White House and the issue of repealing or replacing the Affordable Care Act not completely addressed, managed care pharmacists should feel heartened to know their voices and concerns are being heard, said Susan A. Cantrell, RPh, CAE, CEO of the Academy of Managed Care Pharmacy (AMCP).

Transcript

How do you see uncertainty around health policy with the new administration affecting AMCP members?

Any of us in healthcare right are wondering that same question: how can we deal with the uncertainty, and also how can we focus on what's most important? And that is providing patients with the care that they need. But that uncertainty affects all of us. We can't plan, we can't forecast, we can't accelerate our programs in the way that we want to in this period of uncertainty right now. So I think that is of concern to all of us.

Some members of our board and I, along with commitee members spent 2 day son Capitol Hill earlier this month talking with our elected leaders about some of those very issues, and our message to them was very clear: managed care pharmacy has expertise to lend to address some of the concerns of healthcare, and in particular the rising cost of pharmaceuticals, as well as the need for comprehensive pharmaceutical benefits.

So we offered our expertise and the expertise of our members to our legislators and they're starting to take us up on it. And I think that is an important thing for our members to know, that their voice will be heard as the discussions move forward, and things start to become clearer, hopefully, in the near future.