Week 5: I sit here at my desk in my home office, I am amazed at how the world has changed in such a short period of time. Here in the Boston area, we are in the midst of our peak COVID-19 surge, yet across the country, the practice of healthcare has changed dramatically. For patients with chronic conditions, newly diagnosed patients, and even patients due for annual check-ups, visits to physician practices have either been postponed or gone virtual.
We have talked to a number of our top physician practices to see how their office was handling the current situation and learned that all of the practices are seeing only a small fraction of their patients live and in person. However, people still need medications to treat their chronic conditions, and many prescriptions still require prior authorization in order to obtain managed care coverage.
PARx is fully operational to support our practices with their prior authorization needs, and our PASS system is accessible from any location with internet access. Our call center staff, while working from home, continues to offer the same high levels of service as always, and PAs are being submitted and approved, allowing patients to obtain the medications that their providers deem best suited to treat their conditions.
May 6th marks the beginning of National Nurses Week. The timing couldn’t be more appropriate to honor these heroes who are literally risking their lives to care for affected patients struggling to manage this horrible virus. I would like to thank all those health care employees: physicians, nurses, nurse practitioners, physician assistants, and aides for their selfless service.
To everyone out there, stay safe, stay healthy, and know that we will get through this.