Retail pharmacies

Marcello Bevilacqua

These days, it seems like everyone is talking about specialty drugs. But what about the pharmacies that distribute them?

Specialty pharmacy started as a niche industry in the 1970s. But as more specialty drugs were invented, it grew hugely profitable. Specialty drugs now make up about 2% of prescription volume but account for approximately between 40% to over 50% of pharmacy dispensing revenue, according to a July 2024 interim staff report from the Federal Trade Commission (FTC). That same report found specialty dispensing revenue reached $237 billion in 2023.

Experts say specialty pharmacies can help patients who need more assistance than the average retail pharmacist can provide. But as profits have grown, so has scrutiny.

“I think it probably varies from drug to drug, but in general, within the US healthcare system, we have a major value problem where we spend a lot of money and don’t necessarily get the outcomes that we would expect for the amount of money that we spend,” Allison Oakes, chief research officer at healthcare data analytics firm Trilliant Health, told Healthcare Brew.

Check out our explainer on speciality pharmacies.—CC

      

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Tech

Surgical Science

Tom Englund, the CEO of Sweden-based surgical simulation company Surgical Science, compares operating on a human body to flying a plane: You want the person in charge to have practiced the procedure many times so that there’s no learning on the job.

That’s one of the benefits, he said in an interview, of Surgical Science’s products. The medical simulation technology and software allow doctors and medical providers to train as many times as needed in a specific technique, rather than have their lesson cut short by a cadaver’s limited window of utility.

“You can only use a body like three times, and there’s a big cost associated. You have to keep it in the cooling room,” Englund told Morning Brew. “Many of the skills need repetitive usage, so you would want the student to practice over and over again.”

And it’s not just about how many times a cadaver can be operated on—there’s also a growing training gap in healthcare today. Technology is advancing faster than training is for new techniques, and Englund said Surgical Science aims to “bridge this gap.”

Watch our video about how simulations help surgeons train for the OR.—TC

      

Biotech

Brianne Puglisi

Brianne Puglisi has been part of three IPOs, but Kardigan’s initial public offering in June was her first one as a CFO.

The prior experience, she said, helped her lead cardiovascular biotech company Kardigan to gross $460 million in IPO proceeds and see a 38% first-day pop in share price. Puglisi is not a clinician or a scientist, though, something she recognizes is unique in biotech.

“I started my career at KPMG—I was based out of their New York City offices—and I was working mostly on Fortune 500 clients across a number of different industries. And what drew me to the life sciences sector was really the chance to be part of this ecosystem…working with people who are pursuing much-needed therapies for patients,” she said.

Puglisi told CFO Brew how she communicated with the “super sharp,” highly educated investors in biotech about the company’s three cardiovascular therapies and why public markets were the better funding mechanism for such a young company.

Read the full interview on CFO Brew.—DL

      

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vital signs

Francis Scialabba

Today’s top healthcare reads.

Stat: ~19%. That’s the percentage decline in the private equity deal count across healthcare services in Q2 compared to the same quarter last year. (Fierce Healthcare)

Quote: “I’ve seen nurses get shoved, pushed, scratched. The biggest one is bitten.”—Crystal Dhooghe, a nurse at Henry Ford Genesys Hospital in Michigan, on workplace violence in hospitals (KFF Health News)

Read: Half a dozen clinicians tried to diagnose a patient’s cancer based on a recent biopsy. They couldn’t do it until the AI tool ChatEHR was deployed. (Stat)

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