Home Forums Discussions Problems NewCrop cannot handle 6 preferred pharmacies

Hi everyone,

Any one run into this situation?

For a handful of patients, perhaps 10, I cannot open New Crop. It just will not open. No error message, nothing. The common factor seems to be six preferred pharmacies listed. I contacted AC support, they said just uncheck some of the pharmacies.

I cannot do that. If I open the patient, and go to demographics screen, the pharmacy drop down will show six pharmacies, all checked. I can uncheck one of them, several of them, all of them, I can check or uncheck the preferred box at the top, and it will look like some or all have cleared.

However, if I then go to the most recent encounter screen, and back to demographics, all six pharmacies have returned.

Before electronic prescribing of controlled substances, this was a minor nuisance. I would just print the prescription and we would fax it.

Now, however, for schedule II narcotics, this work around does not work.

So two questions.

1. Has any one run into this? Any idea how to actually delete pharmacies when six preferred are listed? Or anything else to try?

2. Is there any way to log onto New Crop directly, not through Amazing Charts?

Thank you!

Gene

Hi everyone,

In case anyone else is running into the situation, I just found one rather cumbersome work around.

I cannot alter the preferred pharmacies through the demographics screen.

However, use Amazing Charts regular prescription writer. Pick some prescription that cannot be electronically transmitted, one that is italicized or create one that will be italicized. Prepare it, prescribe it, highlight a pharmacy that you do not want as preferred, uncheck the "save select pharmacy as preferred pharmacy" box, and hit the transmit button. It will, of course, give you an error message that it was not transmitted.

The net result of this is that the selected pharmacy will not be preferred. This reduces the number of preferred pharmacies down to five, so the New Crop screen can be opened.

Rather cumbersome but it works, I would still appreciate it if anyone else has an easier solution.

Thanks.

Gene

Hi Gene,

This is a known issue with NewCrop, anything more than 5 preferred pharmacies and it will throw up the error and not transmit.

To remove the pharmacies on the demographics screen, uncheck the boxes for the pharmacies you wish to remove and then click ok. Then make sure to click the save info on the demographics page. This will update the preferred pharmacy list.

Let me know if this works for you.

Hi Chris,

Okay… I feel really stupid… On the demographics page, I was not hitting "update info."

When I do that it works…

Thank you!

Gene

According to NewCrop's EPCS division, you are correct. Five is the limit you can have.

As far as standalone and using their website directly, there is only one option:

Our direct log-in manual entry package meets all state and DEA requirements for electronic prescribing. NewCrop offers unmatched customer support and unequalled office efficiency. Following is a summary of our offering. I have bolded the features unique to NewCrop.

-- Two versions. If cost is an issue, NewCrop Basic provides an electronic patient record and delivery of prescriptions. Cost is $20 per month. NewCrop Comprehensive, $40 a month, adds allergy and drug interactions, patient education in 19 languages, all-doctor prescription history, and all managed care formularies including Medicaid. (Practices with limited prescribing such as dentists, sometimes choose Basic. Most others choose Comprehensive.)

-- Free trial of Comprehensive and minimum 3-month commitment. Decide at the end of 30 days if you wish to continue Comprehensive or drop back to Basic. You are not locked in for a full year.

-- Office efficiency. Electronic Prior Authorization and DME/Supplies are integrated into workflow. Multiple features support efficiency for you and your staff.

-- Scheduled Drugs. EPCS (Electronic Prescribing for Controlled Substances) is available for an additional cost of $150 a year. No dedicated hardware is required. Our system features one-click approval with no typing required.

--The Medical Letter. This drug reference, available for $60 a year, is fully integrated for quick reference to comprehensive drug information. Drugs Of Choice and other publications are included, as well as CME.

-- Personal service. No offshore phone ban or “chatting.” You will be working directly with our support staff.

Finally, NC updates their meds monthly from the company, Multum. AC downloads the Multum data base that is provided to them. NC receives this update once a month from Mutlum.

I'm always trying to keep one pref pharm on the chart, so when a refill comes in I know where it goes. It would be nice if the scripts were in color to match a pref pharm color so you know the Xanax goes to the local pharm down the road and the lipitor goes to the mail in.

Hi everyone,

Bert, thanks for all the information. If I understand correctly, there is no way for us to directly log onto NewCrop, we would have to register and pay NewCrop separately.

Chris, some patients may need 3 or 4 active pharmacies, they use a mail order and several different local ones, and so forth. No one actually needs 6.

I think my problem was twofold. First, I had not realized that the reason that New Crop was failing was because of six pharmacies. Second, I could not figure out how to delete pharmacies.

In any case, problem solved, thanks so much to everyone.

Gene

One of my new roles, now that I have been using AC since 2011 is during the wellness visit, usually, I am the one to go thru and clean up all of the old pharmacies not being used in the demographic section. It is a bit painful to do but saves a lot of time down minimizing mistakes of sending the med to the wrong pharmacy. However, there are quite a few folks that have a mail order and local pharmacy or two, so the quick text back and forth usually helps keep that clarified. But it still gets messy from time to time.

We should all lobby for ability to add and delete preferred pharmacies directly in the prescribing screen. Email Chris?

Wasteful and awkward to go out to demographics to delete unused pharmacies.

Hi Larry,

We've never been satisfied, nor have our users, with our poor design around managing preferred pharmacies so in the new version 11 there is a focus on improving not only this but patient pharmacy management in general. In version 11 you will have the ability to add/delete pharmacies from the prescribe screen, actually from the Pending medications window on the same screen, and you can assign a different pharmacies to different medications without going through that right click/transmit individual med workflow. This is on top of the new ability to return to the the write scripts screen instead of closing all the way out that Bert got for Christmas. We've also added the patient's address, last weight and height to the prescribing screen as well. As a result, the Print/Transmit screen no longer contains the pharmacy selection and has been cleaned up a bit. I'll share the release notes with the visuals as soon as they are completed prior to beta, working on them as we speak.

Will be interested to see those changes, Chris. Thanks.
We do still need the front staff to be able to set the preferred pharm on the demo page.
We also need to see the pharmacy when we hit print/transmit, right?

Great Chris!

Last request would be letter writer field <<pref pharm>> -- allow us to print preferred pharamacy on check-in sheet. The patient can review and write in new ones.

With insurance mail order pharmacies and changing in-network local pharmacies, we're getting multiple pharmacy changes yearly! Then of course there's the 1 prescription that's cheaper cash at a 3rd pharmacy!

With EPCS, the Xmas present is huge and for reconciling medications. Being able to edit pharmacies on the fly is also an incredible addition.

A few other requests would be helpful while we are on this subject:

1. The way Active meds and Inactive meds is set up now is great.
2. But, an option to open both windows side by side would be really great. I know that there is the option to open All meds, and the active meds are in white while the inactive meds are in grey. I am not sure what people use that option for. (I would be interested to know -- maybe I am missing a good feature). But, inactive/active in a separate popup window or just on the screen would be huge. So, let's say for the past five years you have been treating someone for migraines or a mental illness like depression or anxiety. So, they are currently on Lamictal and Paxil. But, they used to be on Topamax,Celexa,Wellbutrin and lithium, it is difficult to go back to inactive each time to check what they have been on especially due to alphabetical order. So, you end up their telling you that the Paxil isn't working, and you say well let's try Wellbutrin. Then, they, of course, tell you they have already been on that drug.
3. The ability to click on a check box that tells the AC script writer not to screw with my head by making the sig disappear over and over. Now, if I write a detailed long sig, I will copy it with CTRL + C before moving on, so that when it disappears, I can paste it back, then paste it back again, then paste it back again.
4. This is for NC. I am not sure what each state allows, but we send three ADHD scripts at a time. So, for Concerta 36 mg, we have to click on it three separate times, and the screen moves a cm, so it is a little bit of a nuisance. I have gone back and forth on this with NC, but they don't think it is worth doing for the few that prescribe three drugs at a time.
5. It is interesting that there are two ways to inactivate a medication. Either right-click and choose inactivate. Or use the button below the med list to inactivate. Would be cool if the right-click gave you "inactivate and reason" or an abbreviated version, and the button would give you "inactivate no reason." I think there are many more medications that I inactivate with no reason than a reason. I wonder psychologically if one had to decide which one to use (certainly you could just continue to do right-click, etc.), you would be more likely to select the reason one. Currently, I delete the reason window so frequently that it becomes habit. Not sure everyone will follow this one. Or maybe they have a suggestion.

It seems as though we are asking for a lot, but I am not sure if I am the only one who thinks that the addition of the prescription writer along with ePrescribe was the best addition to AC. And, if I am not mistaken, one can only ePrescribe if they have support? So, it becomes a focus of ideas and possible changes.

Of course, there are about six of on here compared with 8,000 others.

Yes Jon....the Print/Transmit screen now displays the Pharmacy assigned to each medication. The ability to manage patients pharmacies in the Demographics screen has not been changed.

Chris

Great, thanks.