Job Summary / Purpose

Under the supervision of a licensed pharmacist, a pharmacy technician II, in addition to the tasks of a pharmacy technician I, will perform a variety of activities focusing on specialty pharmacy.  Specialty pharmacy provides complex, high dollar medication therapies to patients with serious and life threatening health conditions such as transplant, HIV, multiple sclerosis, and cancer.  These medications require special handling and intensive patient management touchpoints to ensure patient medication adherence to lower overall healthcare costs and reduce readmission rates. Performs all activities related to prescription processing and daily pharmacy operations workflow for the specialty pharmacy.    Works in a highly regulated environment and must take care to abide by all state and federal regulations that relate to the practice of pharmacy including record keeping and infection prevention standards and will work in accordance with CommonSpirit Health and the specialty pharmacy policies and procedures.   Must understand and abide by rules set forth by all accreditation bodies.

Essential Key Job Responsibilities

For specialty pharmacy patients, duties will include, are not limited to:

• Prescription management:  Interpret and enter prescriptions and clarify prescription orders with pharmacists and/or clinicians as appropriate.  Receives and fills prescriptions per patient request or per notification from the clinical specialty pharmacy team. Accurately bills the prescription to insurance, including commercial and government coverage, copay cards, financial assistance, in accordance with all rules and regulations of each individual covering entity. 
• Shipping:  Identifies medications requiring special storage and/or handling such as hazardous medications and/or refrigerated medication.  Complies with all packaging and shipping regulations and packouts approved by specialty pharmacy leadership in compliance with payor, manufacturer, and Medicare regulations.  Identify and assemble supplies necessary for select medications such as welcome kits, sharps containers, needles/syringes, alcohol swabs, Band-Aids, and manufacturer starter kits.  Prepares medication for delivery to patients and departments
• Communication:  Answers, resolves and triages inbound inquiries.  Provides outbound therapy/medication adherence check-ups.  Secures refill prescriptions. Resolves insurance related issues and assists patients with various forms of financial assistance;Communicates with and assists pharmacy buyers to maintain pharmacy inventory including drug ordering and receiving.  Communicate directly with patients over the phone to assist them in the awareness of their medications.  Communication with specialty teams (dispensing team, clinical pharmacists, liaisons) to provide continued patient care.
• Operations:  Assist in meeting accreditation standards (answering the phone, cold chain testing, etc.) by understanding all rules, policies and SOPs for compliance. Achieve operational objectives by inputting data, performing adjudication on test claims and preparing action plans for follow-up.  Manage, organize, and update relevant data using database applications.  Complies with federal state laws pertaining to pharmacy, including differing counseling requirements by state, HIPAA procedures and policies, etc.  
• Other duties assigned: May include providing outbound therapy/medication adherence check-ups.  Performing prior authorizations, obtaining financial assistance and copay cards for specialty patients at the direction of the site specialty manager and the clinical specialty manager.

Performs all duties of a Pharmacy Technician I to include, but not limited to, answering telephones, data entry and filling of prescriptions, working on the Meds to Beds program, and complying with federal state laws pertaining to pharmacy, including differing counseling requirements by state, HIPAA procedures and policies, etc.

Required Education and Experience

• Required 1+ years retail or specialty  pharmacy technician experience.
• Preferred 3+ years retail or specialty pharmacy technician experience.
• Registered Pharmacy Technician Arizona license
• Active CPT-EXCPT or CPT-PTCB or CPHT certification in good standing
• High School Diploma, or GED, Metropolitan Test or equivalent

Inspired by faith. Driven by innovation. Powered by humankindness. CommonSpirit Health is building a healthier future for all through its integrated health services. As one of the nation’s largest nonprofit Catholic healthcare organizations, CommonSpirit Health delivers more than 20 million patient encounters annually through more than 2,300 clinics, care sites and 137 hospital-based locations, in addition to its home-based services and virtual care offerings. CommonSpirit has more than 157,000 employees, 45,000 nurses and 25,000 physicians and advanced practice providers across 24 states and contributes more than $4.2 billion annually in charity care, community benefits and unreimbursed government programs. Together with our patients, physicians, partners, and communities, we are creating a more just, equitable, and innovative healthcare delivery system.