CIO Bulletin

Valor Compounding Pharmacy – the most trusted partner!

Just imagine that you are leaving the doctor’s office with a prescription after a diagnosis. You notice that the prescription includes special instructions to fill the medication at a compounding pharmacy. Compounding Pharmacy? Where do I find one? And what exactly is a compound pharmacy, anyway?

Don’t be taken aback or be surprised if you don’t find the term familiar—compared to “retail” pharmacies like CVS or Walgreens, compounding pharmacies have a few distinct factors. Generally, a compounding pharmacy is a pharmacy that specializes in making certain medications from scratch. In a traditional retail pharmacy, pharmacists dispense already manufactured medicine, whereas in a compounding pharmacy, the medication is made onsite and customized according to the needs of each individual patient, as prescribed by their physician. Ingredients are to be kept on hand, and when a patient requires a specific treatment, the compounding pharmacist will mix up these ingredients and make the prescribed formula. Compound prescriptions exist because the formula prescribed, in the form it’s prescribed, doesn’t exist, or is on the “national shortage list” and widely unavailable. As such, prescribed compound medications (as a formula) are not FDA approved. However, 100% of the ingredients used to make the compound must be, and the industry’s regulatory bodies govern to ensure this. Commonly, tablets and capsules are compounded, while creams, liquids, lozenges, ointments, and suppositories are other forms of compounded medications prescribed by doctors and used by patients. Innovative delivery methods, unique dosage forms, and special flavorings assist compound pharmacies in providing personalized medications that aren’t mass-produced. The result can be the potential for improved drug therapy outcomes for the patient, although no claims can be made about compounds and their effectiveness.

Nationally, there are various compound pharmacies around the country, but Valor Compounding Pharmacy distinguishes itself from others. Based in the San Francisco Bay Area, Valor is a leader in custom compounded prescription medication, making both sterile and non-sterile prescriptions that are delivered to your door. While the compounding pharmacy space can seem crowded, Valor differentiates itself with one primary characteristic, trust! Trustworthiness, or the ability to be trusted, is one of the most important assets of any business in any industry. In healthcare, however, it’s to be expected. At the top of its list of core values, trust runs deep at Valor Compounding Pharmacy. It has earned the trust of its prescribers and patients through proactive communication, honesty, reliability, quality, and compounding competency, thereby setting itself apart from traditional mom-and-pop compounding pharmacies in California, and throughout the rest of the country.

Valor builds meaningful relationships with honesty and integrity as the foundation for their success!

At Valor, the pharmacist is a partner in the health journey and becomes a trusted partner by advocating for the health and wellbeing of the patient. In building their state-of-the-art facility – they put honesty, via operational transparency, ahead of profits. No longer is the back-end pharmacy trying to hide operations due to the inability to meet industry regulations. Built with the end in mind, Valor’s facility puts the emphasis on full visibility of work performed to make the highest quality products for patients while being an extension of the doctors and providers they serve throughout the U.S. A technology-enabled business, Valor uses various technology and software to maximize operations while ensuring they exceed industry regulations. This type of honest transparency by Valor allows physicians to focus on the healthcare needs of their patients without compromise due to pricing and affordability because they know how much it will cost their patient from the start. And the result? The patients no longer feel anxious or worried about contacting Valor to fill an order because they know what to expect in service, price, and fast delivery times. Rick Niemi, Valor’s Founder and CEO, states, “Honesty and integrity are foundational virtues at Valor, and there is no room to cut corners in the making of prescriptions or in the way we serve our customers, prescribers, and patients. It’s all about them!”

Reliability earns Valor the continued trust of its customers, providers, and patients.

Reliability is a constant at Valor, and patients need their prescriptions on time, not early, and not late. Too early, and there’s a risk of moving up expiry dates of medications unnecessarily. Too late, and the patient has to do without critical medications that are necessary for their wellbeing. Late arriving medication is the fear of many patients with chronic conditions and patients who rely on their prescriptions for day-to-day functioning. Patients look for a reliable pharmacy that will do what they say they will do. To provide dependable service to patients, Valor keeps more than the necessary quantity of ingredients on hand in inventory perpetually, so it can ensure prescriptions can be made and delivered on time. It also requires that Valor overstaffs a qualified and talented workforce daily to keep up with demand and their growing business.

“Valor’s commitment and consistency in the products and services it delivers speaks to its core values, starting with Trust. You can count on Valor!” says Sherine Khalil, Valor Vice President and Chief Business Officer. The most appreciated feature of Valor is its “Fast, Flat, & Free” model. Known for its fast service, flat-rate pricing, and free 2-day shipping on popular compounded medications, such as hormone replacement, ketamine, and bimix and trimix formulations, Valor solves for the unknowns of when and how much. And having gone through rigorous reviews and earning the highest accreditations in the industry, including PCAB, LegitScripts, and Dot Pharmacy, to name a few, while pushing for URAC and others, Valor continues to be the compounding partner of choice in the United States for certain compound formulations. Valor’s earned trust and confidence provides the very platform to serve its customers, including large health systems and telehealth companies, on behalf of its doctors and patients.

Q. Quality is expected in pharmacy, so what makes Valor different?

Quality is a core value at Valor, and in the pharmacy business, it’s expected! They state, however, that this can only be achieved and maintained through sustained investment in people, processes, and technology. “Achieving excellence is the drive behind the intention, effort, and execution of every process at Valor,” says Christine Stephanos, Valor’s Vice President, and Chief Pharmacy Officer. Valor routinely trains and validates staff competencies at the highest industry standards, such as those of PCAB. In the spirit of continuous improvement, Valor is at the forefront of process investments. A notable example of this is the implementation of Propel, a Quality Management System to track, audit, and improve the compounding process to achieve compounding excellence. And as mentioned earlier, Valor’s decision to build an advanced facility positioned the company to far exceed regulatory requirements, including PCAB, state boards of pharmacy, and other compounding standard bodies.

Quality continues to shine through Valor’s brand-recognized website, where prescribers and patients can easily “Get Started” with user-friendly and secure web forms to request refills, prescribe new medications, or simply inquire about its services. Its straightforward approach and back-end security instill a level of trust in quality that goes above and beyond what is typically expected from a pharmacy company.

Q. Competency is the key in what Valor delivers via its strength in knowledge.

There is a culture at Valor that has established repeated success in delivering the highest quality prescriptions in a timely manner. They understand that more than just the prescription made and delivered, the way they work with providers, prescribers, and patients is the key to their success. Christine states, “Valor’s strength in knowledge is a result of consistently hiring industry experts.” Part of the emphasis on knowledge is understanding and connecting with the patient in a way the competition does not. Being present with and active in the patient’s journey to be well is a bed-side-manner that other pharmacies strive for but rarely achieve.

Strength of knowledge is leaned on for far more than just drug making. Always problem solving, troubleshooting, and creating solutions for their customers and patients, it’s the process of working with Valor that others appreciate the most. “Valor’s leadership team and staff have been easy to work and do business with. They customize their offering to meet the exact needs of our client base, and that matters to us!” says My Ketamine Home’s CEO, Kabir Ali. Valor’s team is comprised of a very impressive set of professionals, including licensed pharmacists and pharmacy technicians, an operational team to ensure consistent delivery of prescriptions, and a business team that tracks and measures data to support the pharmacy and operations teams, making things easier, smoother, and more successful for everyone involved. Valor integrates its core values with behavioral assessments that lead to dramatic improvements within the interview, hiring, and ongoing work processes, through weekly check-ins and quarterly performance reviews, thus measuring the overall performance of each individual and department, continuously.

The result is that Valor is now an employer of choice for self-motivated individuals who demonstrate critical thinking, unique problem solving, and whose thirst for learning remains unquenched. Valor’s people are at the very foundation of trust, and likewise, trust is at the foundation of its people.