WOONSOCKET – A recent computer problem at CVS Caremark Corp. caused the pharmacy giant to fill expired prescriptions and to mistakenly skip some standard safety checks, Providence Business News has confirmed.
The issue affected approximately 20,000 prescriptions filled by CVS Caremark’s pharmacy-benefit management (PBM) unit’s mail-order programs, Christine Cramer, a spokeswoman for the company, said in an e-mail.
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Cramer did not disclose precisely when the prescriptions were filled or when the problem was identified, but she said CVS “has not identified any patient safety or clinical issues resulting” from the errors.
“Once we identified this systems issue, we immediately addressed it and took steps to confirm as appropriate that prescribing physicians wanted their patients to continue on their medications,” she said. “We also reached out to regulatory authorities as appropriate.”
Cramer said the problem impacted maintenance prescriptions, which are ongoing treatments for chronic conditions.
In some cases, patients had requested new supplies of their medications and Caremark filled them even though there were no refills remaining. In other cases, prescriptions were dispensed “without going through our standard drug utilization review process,” Cramer said.
The problem was caused by an upgrade to CVS Caremark’s computer systems. Cramer said the company has “taken steps to enhance our quality process for implementation of future systems upgrades.”
The disclosure about the prescription errors comes as CVS works to shore up the troubled PBM division, which lost a net $4.8 billion in contracts for this year because of poor service complaints and other problems.
CVS has bought five PBM companies in recent years: RX America LLC, bought in 2008 along with Longs Drug Stores Corp.; Caremark Rx Inc. and its PharmaCare division, part of the 2007 Caremark Inc. acquisition; and PCS Health Systems Inc., along with its Advance PCS Inc. unit, purchased in 2003.
The acquisitions have left the PBM unit with a complicated information-technology infrastructure. Per Lofberg, who took over as president of the division in January, said last month the company planned to invest a “substantial” amount of money in computer upgrades this year to integrate its information and database systems.
The PBM unit filled about 660 million prescriptions for patients from more than 3,000 organizations last year.
Additional information is available at cvscaremark.com.
