Pharmacy Care Alliance Plans Print, Radio Ads For Medicare Rx Card

The Pharmacy Care Alliance will use print advertisements, radio spots and in-store materials to promote its Medicare drug discount card.

The National Association of Chain Drug Stores is partnering with Express Scripts to roll out a drug discount card through the Pharmacy Care Alliance (¹ (Also see "NACDS/Express Scripts To Offer Medicare Card, 90-Day Supply Through Retail" - Pink Sheet, 19 Jan, 2004.), p. 9).

Under the new Medicare law, card sponsors are prohibited from promoting their card until May 3, when seniors can begin enrolling in the card programs. Seniors can begin using their discount cards June 1.

All card sponsors must have their promotional materials approved by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services.

The Pharmacy Care Alliance's promotional materials will carry a disclaimer that notes the date they were approved by CMS. Draft materials indicate that some of the ads were approved April 3 while the rest await approval, as of April 18.

The Pharmacy Care Alliance print campaign includes four different ads, all of which feature a photograph of a pharmacy setting with an inlay of a generic Pharmacy Care Alliance card.

One goal of the campaign is to promote the role the pharmacist plays in administering the card program. Two of the ads feature a pharmacist leaning over a pharmacy counter to help a patient. One pharmacist ad carries the tagline, "If pharmacists could prescribe a discount card, this would be it."

The second pharmacist ad carries the tagline, "Save up to 40% on prescription drugs. Your pharmacist can tell you how." In smaller print, the ad explains that discounts could be "up to 40% on generic drugs" and "up to 20% on brand-name drugs." The ad notes that discounts "vary by drug" (see ² (Also see "Medicare Rx Discount Card Sponsors Expect To Beat CMS’ Savings Estimate" - Pink Sheet, 26 Apr, 2004.) ).

Two additional print ads feature the tagline, "Save up to 40% on prescription drugs. Your pharmacist can tell you how." One ad depicts a pharmacist receiving a payment from a senior; the other features a pile of cash, including $100 bills.

All of the Pharmacy Care Alliance marketing materials direct seniors to a local network pharmacy, the PCA card website ³ www.PCAcard.com and the toll-free PCA card telephone number. The materials include the Medicare website and phone number.

The Pharmacy Care Alliance also has developed radio broadcast spots to promote its card. Like the print ads, the radio spots direct seniors to their pharmacist to get more information.

The Pharmacy Care Alliance has not yet purchased the radio spots, which will likely run for 60 seconds. The alliance had planned spots in a variety of durations but noted that, due to required disclaimers about the discount card, the radio ads will require 60 seconds.

The Pharmacy Care Alliance card campaign includes in-store materials such as posters and brochures.

Retailers participating in the Pharmacy Care Alliance card program will feature the in-store promotional materials "prominently," NACDS Chairman Mary Sammons said April 18 at the association's annual meeting in Phoenix, Ariz. Sammons is CEO of Rite Aid.

Some retailers may choose to develop their own promotional or educational materials for the discount card program, but will likely also use the Pharmacy Care Alliance materials, Sammons said.

"There will be some customization of overall materials but the quality of the PCA information is very good, so I can't see that people would not be using that information in their store," Sammons said.

NACDS also expects retailers who are offering their own discount cards, including Walgreens and CVS, to promote use of the Pharmacy Care Alliance card.

"I have every reason to believe Walgreens will both accept and offer the Pharmacy Care Alliance card," NACDS CEO Craig Fuller said. Walgreens is sponsoring a card through its pharmacy benefit management subsidiary Walgreens Health Initiatives. CVS also will offer a card through its PharmaCare PBM.

The Pharmacy Care Alliance has already begun training retail pharmacists on the inner workings of the discount card program, and specifically how to enroll seniors in a card plan.

"There is a lot of training going on this month behind the scenes of getting the pharmacist ready," PCA President Mary Ann Wagner said.

"It's turning out that we're going to be doing a lot of webcasts. That's going to be the most convenient way to reach the most people," Wagner said. NACDS also dedicated its mid-April issue of its pharmacy newsletter, The Practice Memo, to the card program

"No one wants to burden the pharmacist...but the reality of it is, that's who the seniors trust. They're going to be getting the questions anyway. We just want to make sure that they have the information and the tools in front of them" to answer the questions, Wagner said.

The Pharmacy Care Alliance had hoped to pay pharmacists for enrolling patients in the card program.

However, the HHS Office of Inspector General issued guidance April 9 stating that payments made by card sponsors to pharmacies for enrolling patients or steering them towards a particular card could violate the federal anti-kickback statute (⁴ (Also see "Medicare Rx Card Marketing Payments To Pharmacies May Be Kickbacks" - Pink Sheet, 19 Apr, 2004.), p. 26).

Fuller noted the IG guidance "complicated things a little bit." However, "it hasn't changed anything except for the fact that some of the resources will have to be deployed in other ways, not shared with the retailers in the way that we originally had expected to."

The Pharmaceutical Care Management Association will be running an ad campaign for the card program as well, CEO Mark Merritt said April 20. Although the PBM trade association is not offering its own card, PCMA wants to ensure "that people know that in the discount card program, it's the PBMs which are going to drive savings," Merritt said.

The association plans to run print ads in the Washington, D.C. area aimed at opinion leaders. The ads, which will carry the tagline "Being carded never felt so good," will run throughout May, up to the launch of the card program June 1.

PCMA is also considering purchasing national cable television spots that would feature the same "carded" theme.

Merritt speculated that most card sponsors will use direct-to-patient mailings to promote their cards. The Pharmacy Care Alliance currently has no plans for direct mailings; however, they "could be something as part of our future plans," Sammons said.