Assignment 1

Part 1. Textbook Exercise 1.6

1.​ The process is application-to-approval. The prescription is put through a Drug Utilization
Review which checks to determine if the prescription contains any drugs that may not be
compatible with other prescriptions.

2.​ The actors in this process are the pharmacists. They have ensure the prescriptions are
valid and then get the proper drugs to fill them and then give it to the customer
- Pharmacy technician and doctor are also actors. The pharmacy technician’s ask the customers
for pick up times, package and label prescriptions and enter the customer details into the system.
The doctor is called if any alarms are raised during automated DUR and will confirm the order
for the pharmacist.

3.​ The customers are the people who are going to the pharmacy to get their prescriptions
filled.
-Insurance company: they pay a portion of the total.

4.​ The tasks in the process are first get the prescription from the customer, then ask if they
would like the prescription filled now or schedule a later pick up time. If they want it filled now
then the pharmacist fills it within 15 min to 1 hour. If they schedule a later time the prescription
is put into a box labeled with the hour preceding the pick-up time. Every hour, one of the
pharmacy technicians picks up the prescriptions due to be filled in the current hour. The
technician then enters the details of each prescription into the pharmacy system. After the Drug
utilization review the system performs an insurance check to determine whether the customer’s
insurance policy will pay for part or for the whole cost of the drugs. Any alarms raised by the
DUR get reviewed by the pharmacist and at times the doctor to confirm the order. After the
insurance policy is figured out the technician has filled a given prescription, the bag is passed to
the pharmacist who checks that the prescription has been filled correctly. Then the pharmacist
puts it in the pick-up area. When a customer arrives to pick up a prescription, a technician
retrieves the prescription and asks the customer for payment in case the drugs in the prescription
are not fully covered by the customer’s insurance.

5.​ This process brings value because it makes it easy for the customer to come back when
they are available to pick up the prescription. The Drug Utilization Review also ensures to the
customer that the drugs they are taking are safe for them to use. Finally they check your
insurance for you and make sure you are paying the proper price for the drugs.
-The value this process delivers to the customers is,convience, safety, efficiency and accuracy.
Convenience through the flexible pick-up times and the insurance check being done for the
customer. Safety, efficiency and accuracy are delivered to the customer through the use of the
DUR automated system.

6. ​ First outcome is if the customer wants their prescription filled now and wait for 15
minutes to an hour or if they want to drop off the prescription and make a pick up time later.
Next the Drug Utilization review is either approved and the drug is safe for the customer to use
or they have to not get this prescription or find another drug that is safe for the customer. The
next possible outcome is the insurance policy: the customer will either have to pay nothing if the
drugs are fully covered by insurance, they might be partially covered and the customer has to
make a co-payment or they are not covered at all and they will have to pay full price.

Prescription is filled within 15 to an hour of being requested.

Prescription is fulfilled at a later time.

Prescription is unable to be fulfilled due to DUR found issues:

- Drugs are found to be incompatible with past drugs

- Not enough data about customer in the system

Drugs in question are replaced by different drugs.

Insurance check is not passed.

7. Performance measures (customer’s perspective):

Time: -is the order fulfilled within the 15min-hour window given by the pharmacy? -is the order
fulfilled at the chosen pick-up time? Measure how long the process takes

Cost: -is it really cheaper to let them do an insurance check vs going with a different 3rd party?
-am I paying a fair price? Measure the cost of going to this pharmacy compared to another.

8. Potential issues: Orders are tended to on an hr-to-hr basis. There may be too many pending
orders to file them all within the hour before the next hour’s box of orders begins to be entered
into the system.

Info needed to be collected in order to analyze: -Quantifiable measures that express the
maximum number of orders that can be accepted in an hour. -Average amount of orders in the
queue (hour box) at a time. -Employee feedback on the workload.

9.​ One possible change that could be made to help fix this issue is having one person deal
with handing out the prescriptions and the main pharmacist focusing on filling the new
prescriptions being submitted

Changes that can be made to the process in order to address the above issue: gather info on
the process (using measures like the ones listed above) and adjust staffing depending on the
outcome. For example, hire another technician to disperse the workload, or adjust technician
hours/staffing to have more working around peak times, like early mornings and lunchtime,
when drop-offs are more frequent.

10. ​ Additional issues to take into account while changing the process while operating in
multiple countries and regions may be adjusting for local peak times; not all countries have the
same rush hours so staffing adjustments would have to be made location by location, rather
than set across all locations.

11.​ Hiring another technician will have an impact on shareholders because it will cost the
company more to pay their staff. You could mitigate this by only having multiple employees
working during busy hours like in the morning and lunchtime when a majority of people would be
getting their prescriptions filled
Part 2. Model the Graduate Admission Process, described in the separate document available on
Brightspace.
Part 3. Text Book Exercise 4.32