Functional Medicine Business Strategy | Abbi Linde, PharmD

This transcript was generated automatically. Its accuracy may vary.

[00:00:12] Mike Koelzer, Host: Hello, Abby. Hello. Thanks for joining us. My pleasure. Great to have you on the, uh, program. Where am I calling you? Where are you in the us? I 

[00:00:20] Abbi Linde, PharmD: am in beaver dam, Wisconsin, 

[00:00:22] Mike Koelzer, Host: beaver dam, Wisconsin. 

[00:00:24] Abbi Linde, PharmD: Um, so do you, you know where Wisconsin is? So where is it? I, where Wisconsin is kind of right in the middle a little bit south.

[00:00:31] Mike Koelzer, Host: we just talked about beavers in our house because we got a new Labrador puppy yesterday, and apparently she has a, a, they call it a beaver tail, which is a little bit wider at the top. It helps me to swim, I guess. So. 

[00:00:43] Abbi Linde, PharmD: Cool. Our mascot is the beaver. Oh, is that right? Beaver 

dam 

[00:00:47] Mike Koelzer, Host: beavers. You know, in cartoons, they always show beavers with their tails, like slapping down mud, but I read last year, that's not true.

They just use it for swimming. They don't, they don't actually slap anything. But I don't know. You guys probably know more than Wikipedia 

[00:00:59] Abbi Linde, PharmD: does. Yeah. I don't know. I'm not originally from beaver dam, so I wouldn't consider myself a beaver expert. So 

[00:01:05] Mike Koelzer, Host: You don't have the old expertise, do you? Right. All right, Abby, introduce yourself and tell us.

It's hot in your pharmacy life right now? Well, I call 

[00:01:17] Abbi Linde, PharmD: myself a functional medicine pharmacist. I am really trying to change my pharmacy from being a regular old dispensing pharmacy to a more clinical pharmacy, a wellness center, uh, a place where people go to get off of medications instead, and hopefully, um, You know, since we're talking about business, hopefully I'm getting paid for those services is kind of helpful.

Yeah. That helps. Right. Right. So trying to set up kind of a business model where I'm able to, you know, have a different revenue stream than actually. In my opinion, it helps people get better as opposed to staying sick. Um, so that's kind of my pharmacy life. Uh, I don't know how much you know about my, uh, hometown pharmacy, but we're actually a group of, uh, we call ourselves a group of independent pharmacies.

Okay. And so I'm kind of transitioning a little bit to where I can actually go out to these, our other hometown pharmacies and help them. I, you know, implement these same things. Services and kind of minding shifts. Yeah. 

[00:02:21] Mike Koelzer, Host: Interesting. Now, how many of, how many in that independent ish chain then? Yes. How many hometown 

[00:02:28] Abbi Linde, PharmD: services?

So we are thinkers up to 72. Wow. We shop co closed. We got a big bump 

[00:02:33] Mike Koelzer, Host: now. Did you come in fresh? Would you call yourself a pharmacy owner? 

[00:02:39] Abbi Linde, PharmD: I am. I'm a partner. Yep. Of how many you want one pharmacy. 

[00:02:43] Mike Koelzer, Host: Yep. And, when did that come to be? I think 

[00:02:46] Abbi Linde, PharmD: it's been almost two years now. 

[00:02:48] Mike Koelzer, Host: And did you guys start as a hometown pharmacy or did that transition?

So it 

[00:02:53] Abbi Linde, PharmD: started as a hometown pharmacy. I was not part of starting it. Gotcha. Um, I came in as a staff pharmacist and then I became the manager. Gotcha. Became a partner. 

[00:03:05] Mike Koelzer, Host: All right. So how would that work? That you're then I'm sure you're not enemies with the other hometown pharmacies, but how would that work with you going to other pharmacies would then somehow the headquarters be in your, in your plan, be like paying you for that expertise to go around.

[00:03:23] Abbi Linde, PharmD: So it's kind of complicated and we're still trying to figure out exactly what the best way is. Essentially. I've been implementing this in my. In my pharmacy. Right. And I've been sharing a lot of the things that I've learned. Mm-hmm with hometown people, just, you know, for free. Yeah. Um, and what we're trying to kind of figure out is a way that.

You know, these other pharmacies can provide some sort of, you know, skin in the game to have me come to their location, but also it benefits the company as a whole. So for our home office to kind of, um, have some sort of skin in the game, I guess you would say. Um, and so it's gonna be a kind of a combination of both.

I at least have to be able to cover. You know, the cost of having someone else staff my pharmacy. 

[00:04:07] Mike Koelzer, Host: Yeah. Right. Yeah. Yeah. At least at least covering that. Mm-hmm and then it's, and then it's kind of like, what, what do you desire? More kind of thing. Right. 

[00:04:13] Abbi Linde, PharmD: And, and also like, you know, for me, I would rather do that.

I don't particularly love staffing, you know, the checking of prescriptions part right. Of pharmacy. And so, you know, that's more what I wanna do, but also I think I have a lot of value to bring, so, 

[00:04:30] Mike Koelzer, Host: You know yeah. And then you'll have to see whether it is, because it sounds like there's three things.

There's, staffing a traditional pharmacy being the clinical. Person in your pharmacy, but then over to the more administration side of helping with the other, you know, 72 exactly. Now between those two, which do you see yourself between the clinical and the yeah. And the traveling administrator? 

[00:04:56] Abbi Linde, PharmD: So my dream would be like half in my store doing clinical stuff and half helping others do those things that's like my dream.

Probably are you just 

[00:05:08] Mike Koelzer, Host: saying that, so you sound like more helpful or would you really rather be more the traveling head honcho going around? 

[00:05:17] Abbi Linde, PharmD: I mean, I think I'm gonna like it, but you don't know yet. Yeah. I've been doing it kind of, uh, casually. So, you know, via phone calls and via Skype.

Right. Um, And I really like it, but I also feel like, I guess we'll see. But if, you know, if you do that full time, you lose a little of it. It's like, I don't know. I used to work for one of the chain pharmacies also. Right. And you know, our DMS would come in and they're, you know, they tell you all these things and you're like, what do you know?

You haven't been practicing for 20 years? Like, you know, nothing. So exactly. You know, I wanna, 

[00:05:51] Mike Koelzer, Host: it's kind of 50 50 now, because for now it's a. Starting point until you say you don't like this, or you like this one more, correct? Right? Correct. I'm 

[00:06:00] Abbi Linde, PharmD: hedging my bets, which is true, but 

[00:06:03] Mike Koelzer, Host: because I'd like to be more on the 72 side, because then I'd have more places to hide.

fair enough. Versus just one. No, that makes sense. That makes sense to split those in your head. Tell me where this fits in. Abby, when you and I talked before the program, we talked about the, I guess, initials, the C P E SN. Now, how does that fit into what we're talking about 

[00:06:28] Abbi Linde, PharmD: here? Yeah. So C P E S N stands for community pharmacy enhanced services network.

So it actually started in North Carolina. They essentially kind of did what their hometown kind of did. Um, they kind of banded together as independent pharmacies, um, and kind of set this level of enhanced services so that they could go to payers, employers and say, Hey, we are a group of pharmacies. We all provide this enhanced level of services with regard to doing, you know, med re appointment based, you know, comprehensive med reviews.

Delivery med sync, all of, kind of like the enhanced services. And we can provide better quality for either patients or employees and you should pay us for it and it was successful. And so now it is a nationwide thing. Um, I think most states have a. Start of a CPS N in each state, not all but most. Um, and it's just a matter of getting adequacy.

So essentially enough pharmacies that you cover the whole state so that you have, you know, bargaining power to be able to mm-hmm and actually to be able to reach enough patients that you can have an impact. And kind of the way that this fits into my story is that I really see C P SN. A tool for, for building that business model, to be able to provide those services and get reimbursed for them.

And so there are several states now that have contracts, um, getting reimbursed for. A variety of things. Last I heard there was an opioid management one and this, 

[00:08:12] Mike Koelzer, Host: and when you say the state's like the state's Medicaid 

[00:08:16] Abbi Linde, PharmD: program or it's different, so, um, not necessarily Medicaid. Um, I know. 

[00:08:22] Mike Koelzer, Host: So something to do with the state though, state employees or state something.

Nope. 

[00:08:26] Abbi Linde, PharmD: Private insurance and or state insurance. It doesn't, it's not necessarily one or the 

[00:08:32] Mike Koelzer, Host: other, but when you say the state, does that mean? The state has like, like the C 

[00:08:36] Abbi Linde, PharmD: P E SN network in a state. 

[00:08:40] Mike Koelzer, Host: Oh, in a state they have the right. Yeah. They're allowed to function in that state as a corporation and so on.

[00:08:47] Abbi Linde, PharmD: Correct. Gotcha. There is there's legal terms about it. 

[00:08:52] Mike Koelzer, Host: Uh, uh, legal, wait, this isn't the, this isn't the legal, the legal pharmacy show. Okay. 

[00:08:58] Abbi Linde, PharmD: Yeah. I don't know them. I just know that, 

[00:09:00] Mike Koelzer, Host: uh, we stay away from legal. We stay away from anything that has to do with medicine, cuz I'm too old and dumber to remember that stuff.

So it's a business stuff we like to talk about. Got it, 

[00:09:08] Abbi Linde, PharmD: got it. So yeah, so they form some sort of a network and then they're able to function together. And so like I know North Carolina and I know Iowa, Randy McDonough and Iowa, um, has like a per. Like a per patient per month model. Gotcha. With an insurance company where they get paid a certain amount of money per month to just manage the health of their patients.

Right. 

[00:09:32] Mike Koelzer, Host: All right. So it seems to me in a program like that, you're only as strong as your. Weakest link participant. So I imagine that it's fairly strong, you know, for example, one of the standards cannot just be like, we're nice. I mean, it's gotta have some teeth to it to prove someone's to a certain standard, I imagine.

Right. Definitely. And you mentioned some pretty big ones of, you know, across the board, but moved up a level. And so would that be self policing? So for example, there's a store that claims this, but I walk into one and they don't do it well, now I'm questioning the whole thing. So with your standards, how is that policed then?

[00:10:11] Abbi Linde, PharmD: Yeah, that's always the risk, right? You say we do all these things and then someone walks in somewhere and they don't do the thing. 

[00:10:17] Mike Koelzer, Host: I know it, you know, and, and that's where you, you guys have solved this, so, 

[00:10:20] Abbi Linde, PharmD: Well, yeah, I mean, so essentially, um, each state has their own. Um, we call 'em luminaries. So kind of people who coordinate the, um, communication.

Gotcha. And addition, you know, training if people need support. Right, right. The recruitment, all of those things. And so, um, the other thing is you have to,

they have a website where you can kind of report your. Your address and all of the services that you provide. Gotcha. Um, and that's, uh, done like by the pharmacy. Themselves, so kind of report into a database so that people can search. So that's gotcha. That's just a little bit of accountability because if you, yeah, right.

Put it out into the, into the, you know, the interwebs. Yeah. Um, it's there, it's like on 

[00:11:11] Mike Koelzer, Host: Facebook, you're not gonna put a bunch of stuff about your pharmacy. Well, unless the marketing and the business part of things are opposite with each other, but, yep. 

[00:11:20] Abbi Linde, PharmD: So, so there's that part? The other thing is one of the requirements is that you, um, SU you complete and submit care plans or e-care plans.

Mm. I see. See, have you, have you heard of 

[00:11:31] Mike Koelzer, Host: them? Well, let's pretend I have, but for the listeners, let's 

[00:11:36] Abbi Linde, PharmD: explain it to them. Okay. So the quick version, uh, a care plan is just like we've identified a problem. Someone has, you know, uncontrolled high blood pressure. Um, we make an intervention, whether it's. You know, adherence to MedSync or recommending a medication change or in my world, you know, recommending nutrition or lifestyle changes, and then tracking the outcome of that.

Mm-hmm . And so it's just, you know, an eCare, all, all eCare plan is documenting those interventions that we're having every single day and just documenting them. And so. Our vendor, we're able to submit our e-care plans right through our pharmacy system. And so that's being submitted and gathered. And so that, that helps with both accountability to ensure that things are being done in all the pharmacies, but also.

The gathering of problems and interventions and data that pharmacies are doing every day and nobody knows about, and you know, that we're able to take that information and go out to. Buyers. 

[00:12:43] Mike Koelzer, Host: Yeah, that makes sense. I once heard that, um, oil change places do a better job than pharmacies on, on documenting.

Yes. And cuz they come up with the we're terrible at it. 15 things they've done, you know, and I think pharmacies, maybe haven't done it too because it does hold them to a higher standard. Where if you say then we've done these 10 things with the prescription or with your profile. Well then you better have.

You know, mm-hmm and sometimes that's even hard to figure out even in one pharmacy. So, you know, to get everybody in the same team. Yep. For 

[00:13:16] Abbi Linde, PharmD: sure. Definitely a challenge. 

[00:13:18] Mike Koelzer, Host: If, if you could, would you like to see every independent pharmacy doing this? Or would you say I'm not gonna, I don't really want the one.

Two miles away doing this. How do you see it as a, you know, a, a nice forward movement, obviously you don't want every pharmacy doing it or else you maybe don't stand out as much. 

[00:13:40] Abbi Linde, PharmD: Um, I don't know. I guess to be honest, I feel like all independent pharmacies need this. Absolutely. Yeah, you don't have a choice.

I wouldn't begrudge them. You know, if, even if they were two miles down the street, I wouldn't, you know, I would never say I don't want them to do it. And I just feel like, you know, what's, I don't even know what the saying is the rising tide, whatever, all ships, what? Yeah. Everybody pulls up. I just feel like our reputation is.

Pharmacists and pharmacies, if we can, you know, improve that and raise that and bring it to a more like healthcare professional status. Right. I think that's good for all of us. Yeah. And so, and it's kind of like, you know, I, I can tell people. So I'm blue in the face that pharmacists are healthcare providers and we, you know, do clinical interventions and all of these things, but then someone goes into a super busy pharmacy and becomes a pharmacist.

Yells got any questions. Yeah. Like that, you know, is bad for me too. So, yeah. I don't know. That's kind of my opinion about it. 

[00:14:45] Mike Koelzer, Host: How do you guys and gals at your store promote this program? So we 

[00:14:52] Abbi Linde, PharmD: don't necessarily promote C CPS N 

[00:14:55] Mike Koelzer, Host: because that's too vague for people. 

[00:14:57] Abbi Linde, PharmD: Well, it's more of a framework for your thing.

For like the business part. Um gotcha. But what we do is we market some of the services that we do because of it. So, gotcha. We have been on a really big med sync kick lately. I was kind of weirdly resistant to med sync. And then I went to a conference and talked to all of the, like, you know, Famous pharmacy people.

Right? Um, they're all liars though. Well, it was crazy to me that every single one of them was like med sync. Med sync was the first thing I did that gave me time to be able to do all this clinical stuff. And I was like, really? And now I'm doing it. And I'm like, I think they might be right. Are you serious?

I just hit 40% of my patients. And I like to look around and I'm like, I I'm. I have time. It's weird. I mean, I have 42 other things that I'm working on outside of the pharmacy stuff. Yeah. So I always have something to do, but I, I it's. So it feels so much more efficient. That it's weird. I will just say, 

[00:16:05] Mike Koelzer, Host: I don't know about that.

A we've I'm not gonna tell you how many times we've tried it, but we've tried it. And, um, it's the software. It's the 

[00:16:13] Abbi Linde, PharmD: software. Yeah. I don't know if I'm allowed to say, but the one that we. Is the one that all the other people have and it is clutch. It, it, you don't lose people like you don't accidentally miss their sync date.

Um, it prompts you to, it prompts you. It does all the things for you. So all you do is the same stuff you always do. You just do it all at one time instead of six times during the month. 

[00:16:38] Mike Koelzer, Host: I don't know. , 

[00:16:39] Abbi Linde, PharmD: we'll have to schedule another call to talk about med sync. I think 

[00:16:43] Mike Koelzer, Host: one of my guys that was helping me on, I won't tell you what this was, but he came in and he said, it's almost like people are sabotaging it.

[00:16:54] Abbi Linde, PharmD: like employees. Not 

[00:16:56] Mike Koelzer, Host: like customers don't call it's like, it's like you, you would've called, like, he spent like a half hour with this person the day before. And the next day the person called, like, they had never called the pharmacy in their life. And they're asking for something that they just agreed on.

Like the day before, you know? Yes. And God bless the patient. I'm picking more on the idea than the patient. Yes. Because that's just, I get it. Human nature. 

[00:17:18] Abbi Linde, PharmD: Yes. No. So a hundred percent prove me wrong. No, there are people that cannot will not. Just med sync will not ever work because their adherence is like crazy or they're constantly changing or whatever, but they say 

[00:17:33] Mike Koelzer, Host: they want 

[00:17:34] Abbi Linde, PharmD: to.

Yeah. So there are people like that, but it's like a handful and you just get annoyed about those handful and forget about how efficient it makes all the other people. So you have more time to deal with those people that are screwing up your meds sync because everything else is super easy, efficient.

[00:17:51] Mike Koelzer, Host: Mm. You're at what? 40, what? 40? We 

[00:17:54] Abbi Linde, PharmD: just hit 40%. Yep. Of, of, of all patients are on it of prescriptions filled this month were filled through med zinc. Dang. Yeah, I'm told, I'm told that's like the magic number. We won't 

[00:18:07] Mike Koelzer, Host: mention it right now, but I think we have the same software you do. Okay. We 

[00:18:10] Abbi Linde, PharmD: can talk about it.

[00:18:11] Mike Koelzer, Host: Maybe it's just a Michigan thing. Maybe we're just stupid over here. 

[00:18:16] Abbi Linde, PharmD: no, there is, there are some like, You know, tricks that you have to know. And also, okay, so it's talking about business, right? So when you sell it to a patient, right, you can't say like, oh, do you wanna enroll in our med sync program? It will really help your adherence.

And you know, it's gonna help my star. Like, no, like that's not what you say. You say. Hey, you, you were just here yesterday. Would it be easier if I got 'em already so that you could pick 'em up all at the same time? Like sell it to them, like why would it be good for them? And then they're all over it.

They're like, yeah, that would be amazing if I could just come once a month or once every three months 

[00:18:56] Mike Koelzer, Host: or whatever. Yeah. I suppose they don't even have to know that it's they don't have to know it's a service. It's just like, you're helping, 'em get it all 

[00:19:01] Abbi Linde, PharmD: together. Oh. And would you like me to, to get your supplements on auto fill with that too?

Okay, amazing. I'm happy to do that for you as a service too. See how you can do that. I'm not gonna tell 

[00:19:14] Mike Koelzer, Host: the listeners right now, Abby, but I can see you pulled out your script and you're reading. No, I'm just kidding. no, no, I, I, I know, I know you're really doing this, but I don't know. I guess we'll have to give another 

[00:19:23] Abbi Linde, PharmD: try.

Okay. So also let me just add on to the benefits. Oh, would you like us to sit down and do a med review with you when you come in and you get all your. We're happy to do that. Then when you sit down. Oh, did you know that we have a weight management program? Oh, do you know? We can do a nutrient depletion assessment for you.

So I just feel like it, it allows you to, it opens the door to be able to have conversations about all these other services too, because yeah. Their meds are simple and easy and it's fine. Like we'll just, we'll get, 'em all organized. Um, and then we can work on things like health. Yeah, and we can, you know, we can talk about, okay, you're on four blood pressure meds.

What's going on? Is there something we can do about this from a nutrition lifestyle standpoint? Um, yeah. 

[00:20:07] Mike Koelzer, Host: And, and I imagine on their side too, that they've got some of the same issues on their side too, of like, oh, it seems like I'm calling the pharmacy every few days or running out of this running or that.

Yes. And so if you get, if you get them thinking. Along that, Hey, this is like once a month kind of thing, then they've got actual mental time to be able to buy into some of those programs. And so for sure, 

[00:20:28] Abbi Linde, PharmD: absolutely. And then you get the people who are like, oh, but I like coming in to see you. Well, that's it.

Okay. That's it. Then they don't go on that sync and that's fine. 

[00:20:37] Mike Koelzer, Host: we don't anymore. But years ago, you know, the pharmacies had post offices and all that stuff, and there'd be people that would find a reason to come in once a day. That was their, you know, that was their thing. Well, we're 

[00:20:47] Abbi Linde, PharmD: in a grocery store, so we have, you know, some elderly people who literally go to the grocery store every day.

Oh, I bet. Every day. And so they're like, why would I sink my meds when I am here? Every single day. It's a good point. You don't need to sync your med. That's fine. 

[00:21:02] Mike Koelzer, Host: Uh, yeah, I guess that's, I guess that's true. I 

[00:21:05] Abbi Linde, PharmD: still, I still try to sync people, even if they don't like it, they aren't super pumped about it. It's better for us to med sync, right?

Because it allows us to predict staffing. It allows us to have better control of inventory. It's more efficient for us. So if people don't care, I still try to enroll them. But if they're anti, obviously I 

[00:21:24] Mike Koelzer, Host: don't. Yeah, because if you're at 40%, that is true. You're predicting staffing. It's one thing being at 5% and creating this whole damn program just for this 5%, but at 40%, you're, you're shifting, you're making some shifts 

[00:21:36] Abbi Linde, PharmD: mm-hmm for sure.

And I just feel like the more I can predict cuz pharmacy feels so UN predict. Right. You never know, like you can tell Mondays are gonna be busier. If it's the day after a holiday, it's gonna be crazy. There are certain things, but then weather and events in the community, like you, you can't predict other things.

And so anything I can do is right. You know, have some sort of a yeah. Flexibility with, with the amount of work. So I can run. You know, in advance or I can do it the day it's due. Like I have some flexibility. Yeah. If we have a crazy busy day, we just don't work on any of our med sync filling and that's 

[00:22:15] Mike Koelzer, Host: fine.

Yeah. And that helps I'm sure. Both logistically and also just, just mentally, if you can cut arguably 40% of the things down that you can predict them. That just makes a lot of things. A lot of things are better. . Yeah, I think so. How would somebody listening to us now take a step? Would it be getting in touch with, uh, C P E SN or if they haven't yet started a trial of doing some of these things first or, or what do you think?

Well, 

[00:22:44] Abbi Linde, PharmD: CPS N has a ton of what they call service sets. So they have a med re service set and a med sync service set and all the different service sets. So it's kind of like best practices, right? So, they also have a bunch of, um, resources for a bunch of different vendors to be able to do these services.

So, you know, if in my opinion, if you're trying to become a pharmacy that is doing more services mm-hmm or wants to be able to do more services, CPS N is a really. Logical step to have access to the resources, to provide the data that CPSM needs to then go to payers. Right. And also to then get the benefit of being able to get paid when that occurs in your state.

So, yeah. So definitely reaching out to your state. CPSM I, like I said, I think most states now at least have. Small group of people. Um, we just got in Wisconsin, we just got a board seat. We have 40. So we're super pumped about that. So I don't really know. You got a board 

[00:23:50] Mike Koelzer, Host: seat on 

[00:23:51] Abbi Linde, PharmD: the, on the, on the USA, CPS, N board from 

[00:23:55] Mike Koelzer, Host: your state?

Yeah. How many are on that board? 

[00:23:59] Abbi Linde, PharmD: I don't know how many there are now. I think a bunch just got added cuz a bunch just hit. A bunch of states, hopefully it's 

[00:24:05] Mike Koelzer, Host: not over 50 or else you guys are. Yeah. Right. 

[00:24:08] Abbi Linde, PharmD: or else you should. No, I think it's like, if I had to guess it's like, yeah. 10 to 15. 

[00:24:14] Mike Koelzer, Host: Well, that's cool. Good for you.

Yeah. We're excited. That's cool. Pharmacists could just go online, look, look that up. And yep. If you 

[00:24:19] Abbi Linde, PharmD: decide like CPS N and your state. It will come up. I think there's even, there's a specific CPSM website and you can find, um, go on that Google thing, that Google thing. Yeah. I probably should have had a link here for you guys.

[00:24:31] Mike Koelzer, Host: No, no, no people can, you know, it's interesting because I'll talk to some business people and, you know, friends and stuff that are thinking of ideas for businesses and, um, and fact, my best friend, uh, he makes bird feeders in his tool and die shop and he. Pretty concerned that this company that was doing some of his website work had not, not re upped his, his website name and, and he lost it, but you know, you just don't really, it doesn't really matter anymore with Google when you're go, when you're going on and looking up a pharmacy, you know, it doesn't really matter so much.

It's something, something pharmacy or something RX or this or that, cuz Google is just pulling it up. Cause you can read your mind. And, but in the old days, you know, five years, 10 years ago, it mattered because you couldn't find these things as easily. Now, you could have just about anything for your website name, as long as it wasn't derogatory.

If people happen to look in the URL and it had your right competition's name on it or something like that. Right. But you can be just about, about anything you want to be. Hey Abby, if you could do anything. During your day as the owner partner, and you had enough of the little people helping you out with, uh, no, I'm just joking.

but if you had enough staff doing everything else, what would you be doing all day? 

[00:25:54] Abbi Linde, PharmD: If I was in my pharmacy, let's 

[00:25:55] Mike Koelzer, Host: say business 

[00:25:56] Abbi Linde, PharmD: wise. Well, right now I'm working on a big launch for my weight management program. I really like the creative part. So creating programs, creating structure to be able to do my programs.

Um, so that's, that's what I like to do, like in the pharmacy, if I, I have a resident and so he's been training this whole month, and so he's been doing a lot of staffing and so I've had some, we'll call it free time, um, where I've been working on stuff. And that's what I've been working on, is really trying to.

Put a system in so that I can be getting people into my program while I'm going around the state training. Other people. Yeah, and this is still kind of just clicking around in the background. 

[00:26:40] Mike Koelzer, Host: So, so kind of creating what now, for example, on that, how much are you depending on PSN to, to help with that creation of things they have and people, you know, versus you making your own program?

[00:26:53] Abbi Linde, PharmD: So the weight management program is my program, and I would say I use CPS N resources as a starting point. Um, I generally take them and. You know, personalize them or. Yeah. 

[00:27:10] Mike Koelzer, Host: Your own, your own, your 

[00:27:11] Abbi Linde, PharmD: own take. Yeah. I do think, you know, there's something to be said for templated things, because it's a really good starting point for best practices.

Yeah. But communities and pharmacies and staffing are just different everywhere. And so to be able to take that stuff and kind of make it work in your pharmacy is important. Yeah. Um, trying to fit a square into. Right. You know, I'm all all with the metaphor is that I don't actually know the actual thing 

[00:27:41] Mike Koelzer, Host: I, but you know what I mean?

I spent about five minutes a week ago trying to get out. I think I was actually talking to my daughter on the podcast. Cause I was trying to figure out that you create your own luck kind of, you know, and it took me about five minutes. I started with, well, you do a thousand things and then you, and finally, finally I found the metaphor.

We're gonna take some. Take some time sometimes. What do you hate about your day? 

[00:28:04] Abbi Linde, PharmD: I don't love the, the just product reviewing part. Um, we actually got in order to solve that problem. I got one of my tech certified as a tech check tech, so she can do, uh, final product verification. So really anything that I don't like to do, I just really try to not.

[00:28:22] Mike Koelzer, Host: Do it, so the tech is doing the final, the 

[00:28:24] Abbi Linde, PharmD: final check. Yeah. So we have the, you know, the pre-check or the clinical review of the oh, gotcha. Prescription separate from gotcha. The product 

[00:28:32] Mike Koelzer, Host: review. Gotcha. Is that a state kind of set 

[00:28:36] Abbi Linde, PharmD: thing? Yeah. Our state had a pilot program. I think it's about to become.

You know, law or whatever, a rule. 

[00:28:42] Mike Koelzer, Host: So you're really doing the clinical thing and making sure it goes together and so on. And then they're trained to actually do the, the physical barcoding, checking up and 

[00:28:50] Abbi Linde, PharmD: things like that. Yeah. And, we use barcodes in the filling process. So yeah, there, you know, there's not too many mistakes that get through to the final verification, but actually my tech.

I don't know if I should say this on the radio. She's probably better at it than I am. She's so detailed. she's gonna ask for a raise. Is that right? Uh, no, she's so good at it. And so then that just allows me to do other stuff. And so anything that I don't like doing in the pharmacy, I just really try to bring in people that either like doing it or will do it 

[00:29:23] Mike Koelzer, Host: or well, you know, I've always thought of that.

It's. right now. If someone said to me, Mike, for your store, we're gonna give you. You know, hundreds of millions of dollars to do all this. And so on and years ago, I might have said, well, you know, to be the head of that, you're gonna be basically sitting in a high rise in Chicago somewhere or something.

That's something that big, I think now that I would do that. And earlier, I'm not sure sometimes you just like to do certain things still. Mm-hmm I've got. A hundred things I should do around the house. And the one thing I don't mind is writing the lawnmower, everything else I hate. But I don't mind.

Yeah. Maybe it's the vibration in Hama. The lawnmower makes me forget about the other 99 that I'm supposed to be doing. That's funny. 

[00:30:13] Abbi Linde, PharmD: Hey, whatever it takes, what 

[00:30:15] Mike Koelzer, Host: would you be doing, Abby, if you were not in the pharmacy profession? 

[00:30:20] Abbi Linde, PharmD: Um, I don't know. Probably something like a nutritionist or something like, I don't know.

Yoga teacher. Something kinda holistic E something holistic E . Yeah. Like wellness, Missy, you know, like I use the word holistic to describe what I do, but always with the caveat, because it's not like, woo, woo. Holistic. Like, I don't wanna offend anybody, but like. You know, energy healing or crystals, like not that kind of holistic sure.

Just holistic in the sense that we're like taking the whole person into consideration, you know? Yeah. So, but yeah, 

[00:30:59] Mike Koelzer, Host: that, yeah, that's a pretty, a pretty, um, I guess nowadays, you know, that's a pretty wide, wide definition. Mm-hmm and you can put a lot of different, you know, a lot of different stuff into it.

Yep. Yeah. That makes sense. What would you do right now? If they said, Abby, you, you got a year off, you can't do anything. Medical, your business will be fine. You can't improve yourself. Like you, you can't go home and read books about, I can't go to school business, I suppose you'd go to school. Was that what you would do?

Um, I 

[00:31:29] Abbi Linde, PharmD: don't know. I am doing some training through, uh, Institute for functional medicine. And so I haven't been able to do the final step for that yet. So that is on. To do list. What is that? Yeah. So the Institute for functional medicine, it's for practitioners, it's mostly targeted towards physicians, PAs, NPS, like prescribers.

Yeah. Um, to help them figure out how to incorporate functional medicine. To learn the science of functional medicine and also like how to incorporate it into your business. What's functional medicine? So functional medicine is the idea that you're treating or managing the underlying cause. So blood pressure is always the example that I use.

So someone has high blood pressure. We know that we have to give them medication to bring down their blood pressure so that they don't have a stroke. Right. Like sure. That's what we know. And that's yeah. Science. Okay. We also like that it shouldn't be the last step. Sure. Right. Right. So we bring down the blood pressure so that no one, you know, has a stroke, but also why do they have high blood pressure?

Yeah. Is it inflammation? Is it sodium? Is it sugar in the diet? Is it stress? Is it lack of sleep? Is it? Whatever. Yeah. Um, and trying to address that reason, that's all functional medicine is, it's just trying to figure out what the underlying root cause of things is and treat that instead of just treating the symptoms.

Yeah. That's 

[00:32:55] Mike Koelzer, Host: cool. Because 

[00:32:56] Abbi Linde, PharmD: it's like, it should, it, it always should be that way. Yeah. But. It's 

[00:33:01] Mike Koelzer, Host: no, there's not really all that many things as it comes down to it. Right. Because you could say a ton of 'em is probably the people's diets in obesity, but that's, that's a little bit higher level too, because that's probably usually going down to a, a mental, like maybe a self, a self love.

Kind of thing. I mean, it probably gets, it probably gets pretty narrow. You can 

[00:33:23] Abbi Linde, PharmD: go down a rabbit hole that's for sure. Yeah. You know, is there obesity caused by the foods that they're eating? Is it caused by, uh, you know, mental health condition or even just kind of an addiction? Is it caused by, you know, uh, you, uh, or, or sometimes a socioeconomic biome, right?

Yep. Neo microbiome, socioeconomic all, you know, it could, it's a lot of things. And so. Identifying the root cause isn't always super easy. The good news is that there's a lot of times kind of like low hanging fruit yeah. That we can address like, oh, you're only getting three hours of sleep a night. Let's work on that first.

Right? Yeah. And you can kind of, and so kind of what I do since I'm not a prescriber and I can't do some of the testing and some of the things I always start with those low hanging fruits and people. Get better. Mm-hmm and that's fun for me and for them. 

Yeah. 

[00:34:17] Mike Koelzer, Host: It's amazing to see that. Yeah. Do you think any of that obesity could be caused by a quart and a half of Breyers butter pecan ice cream each night?

[00:34:26] Abbi Linde, PharmD: Every night, maybe 

[00:34:28] Mike Koelzer, Host: I'm just asking for a friend. 

[00:34:29] Abbi Linde, PharmD: Yeah. yeah Right. Of course. 

[00:34:32] Mike Koelzer, Host: Abby, nice talking to you. Yeah. Yeah. It was nice talking to you. Yeah, thank you. Best wishes and everything. How can people reach out if they have questions on what we did here? What's the, what's the one best way to get ahold of you 

[00:34:44] Abbi Linde, PharmD: probably send me an email.

I'll give my email address. I guess how many people you got listening to this 

[00:34:54] Mike Koelzer, Host: billions. Okay. There's gonna be a brown out in your city from the energy that I have. So many listeners are just gonna, your pharmacy. Won't be able to function. 

[00:35:03] Abbi Linde, PharmD: Okay, well, I better not do it then. I have a Facebook page called evolve wellness with Dr.

Abby. That's more for a client though. Okay. 

[00:35:12] Mike Koelzer, Host: But someone could message you from there. Sure. 

[00:35:14] Abbi Linde, PharmD: Sounds good. So it's evolve wellness with Dr. Abby a B, 

[00:35:19] Mike Koelzer, Host: B I a B B I. Yep. All right. Very good Abby, nice meeting you. I hope to keep in touch. Nice meeting you as well. All right. Thank you. Thanks.