CINCINNATI — The shelves stay stocked at the St. Vincent de Paul Charitable Pharmacy. As Southwest Ohio's only free pharmacy, there's no shortage of medication — and no shortage of people who need it.
Opened in 2006 after local organization Leadership Cincincinnati advocated for a law change to allow for charitable pharmacies in the state of Ohio, the pharmacy now has a main facility at the Don & Phyllis Neyer Outreach Center and a second at the Western Hills Thrift Store.
87% of the pharmacy's medication is supplied through donations from local health care and drug companies. The rest is purchased through available funds.
"In essence, this is a normal pharmacy, a traditional pharmacy, the only difference is we don't have cash registers," said Rusty Curington, charitable pharmacy director.
The program provides vital medications to roughly 700 monthly patients a month. Those patients are either without health insurance or are underinsured and otherwise unable to afford their prescriptions.
Curington said his team filled about 7,000 prescriptions in the first year of service. Last year, they filled 70,000.
"On average, people who come to us receive $8,000 worth of meds in a year and walking out knowing that they could not have afforded that in any other way, it truly means so much," Curington said. "I hear those words to our staff, 'You saved my life,' and those are words that just fuel us to keep going."
Of the charitable pharmacy's patients, Curington said about 60% have diabetes — a costly disease to manage. Those patients are able to receive insulin at the pharmacy at no cost. The life-saving medicine can, on average, run around $200 for a single dose.
"I would say giving out free medication doesn't seem like a good business model, but here we are 16 years later, 700,000 prescriptions have left our facility to care for those who couldn't afford it otherwise," Curington said.
Now, the pharmacy is gearing up to celebrate a major milestone.
Since its opening more than a decade ago, Charitable Pharmacy has dispensed more than $99 million worth of free prescriptions and Curington said it's going to hit the $100 million milestone by the end of October.
But the charity doesn't end at the bottom of a prescription bottle.
The program has expanded its services into more clinical work, and two years ago a nurse practitioner joined the site.
"She can monitor these health conditions, prescribe here on site, do the essential labs that are needed and all the while our insurance navigator is here helping people get insurance, Medicare, Medicaid, Marketplace," Curington said. "We're hoping that we can build support to where you can go to traditional care services and have much more access than we can provide."
Now, as the need continues to grow in the community, the Charitable Pharmacy is hoping to fill even more prescriptions.
Plans are already in the works to expand services and open a third free pharmacy inside the St. Vincent de Paul Thrift Store location in Clermont County.
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