Retail involves selling goods or services from a business directly to consumers for personal use. It deals with small quantities, unlike wholesale, which is about buying in bulk. Retail sales occur at a specific location and are distinct from online sales, requiring direct, point-of-sale transactions to the end user.
The healthcare retail market encompasses various segments, each catering to different aspects of consumer health needs. This market can be broadly categorized into two main segments: Retail Pharmacy and Durable Medical Equipment (DME) with Direct-to-Home Medical Supply Equipment below it.
Retail pharmacies are storefront locations where consumers can purchase prescription medications, over-the-counter medications, and other health-related products.
Meanwhile, home medical equipment (HME) is designed so that even non-professionals or family caregivers could easily use it to manage patient care at home or in non-clinical settings. Often termed “durable medical equipment” (DME), these devices are built for repeated use by the patient or caregiver in a home environment.
DME that Medicare covers include, but isn’t limited to:
- Blood sugar meters
- Blood sugar test strips
- Canes
- Commode chairs
- Continuous passive motion machines, devices & accessories
- Continuous Positive Airway Pressure (CPAP) machines
- Crutches
- Home infusion services
- Hospital beds
- Infusion pumps & supplies
- Lancet devices & lancets
- Nebulizers & nebulizer medications
- Oxygen equipment & accessories
- Patient lifts
- Pressure-reducing support surfaces
- Suction pumps
- Traction equipment
- Walkers
- Wheelchairs & scooters
Medicare pays for different kinds of DME in different ways. Depending on the type of equipment:
- You may need to rent the equipment.
- You may need to buy the equipment.
- You may be able to choose whether to rent or buy the equipment.
Both retail pharmacies and DMEs have added online features to their stores where clients can buy medicines and medical equipment through the internet in specific websites catering to such services.
Leveraging the use of the internet, the retail healthcare sector has found various types of software to process transactions and manage operations. Pharmacy management systems like ScriptPro Central, Rx30, and FrameworkLTC offer features such as prescription processing, inventory management, and financial reporting, which help pharmacies streamline their dispensing and sales processes. In addition to pharmacy-specific systems, there are also medical point-of-sale (POS) systems like Clover POS and Starcode POS, which cater to various healthcare settings including doctor’s offices, pharmacies, and clinics. These systems manage sales, customer relationships, and inventory, and often offer features like contactless payments and patient data management