Pharmacy Chain Gets Boost for Its Health Care Clinics

A new affiliation between doctors at health centers based in Duane Reade pharmacies and a New York City teaching hospital lends credibility to the recently launched retail health clinics.

The doctors now have admitting privileges at St. Luke's-Roosevelt Hospital Center, a member of the Continuum Health Partners network of hospitals that also includes Beth Israel Medical Center.

The new affiliation, predicated on a review of the physicians' credentials, means patients may receive follow-up care or see a specialist at St. Luke's-Roosevelt after an initial visit at a Duane Reade.

"It's a whole new level of protection for the consumer to know that their physician and the physician's credibility have been reviewed by a hospital corporation," the chairman of Consumer Health Services, which manages the clinics, Dr. James D'Orta, said. "It also assures that we have a continuum of care. You don't want someone to come in and be treated and then be released into the stratosphere."

Launched in May, the clinics operate out of four locations around Manhattan, in stores situated at the intersections of Broadway and West 50th Street, Broadway and West 97th Street, Broadway and West 63rd Street, and Lexington Avenue and East 86th Street. They are open seven days a week, and an additional 42 centers are planned for the near future.

There are 22 full-time and part-time physicians staffing the clinics, and a full-time physician can earn up to $150,000 a year working for Endres Bowers Medical Group, the corporation that staffs the clinics. Doctors also receive a full benefits package, including the cost of medical malpractice insurance.

Reached yesterday by telephone, the medical director of Endres Bowers, Dr. Susan Bowers-Johnson, said: "For me, it's an access to care issue."

Dr. Bowers-Johnson, who practices family medicine at NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital, said she recently recruited a doctor from NewYork-Presbyterian and another from Mount Sinai Medical Center.

Although the clinics ideally are for routine health concerns, she said she had just helped treat a 16-year-old boy who displayed an anaphylactic reaction after eating pine nuts.

"Ideally, it's not urgent things we take care of," she said. "We want to be available to the public when their physicians are not available to them."

Citing a shortage of primary care in New York, Continuum said the partnership would help fulfill that need. Its senior vice president for ambulatory care and medical enterprise, Adam Henick, also said the partnership would bring business to the hospital network. "There's a significant amount of business that can wind up in Continuum hospitals through this relationship," he said.

The Duane Reade clinics are part of a growing retail health care movement.

Since 2000, CVS has operated MinuteClinics, on-site health centers. There are 200 such clinics nationwide, including one in New York City that is situated on Highland Avenue in Staten Island. The company plans to add another 200 clinics by the end of the year, although there are no definitive plans to add sites in New York City.

Unlike Duane Reade clinics, the MinuteClinics are staffed by nurse practitioners and physician assistants, a practice that is unlikely to change.

"For the types of illnesses the clinics treats, the plans would be to continue that practice," a spokesman for MinuteClinics, Brent Burkhardt said.

Over the past year, Duane Reade, which operates 244 stores in New York, has moved toward becoming a health resource for its customers.

In February, the pharmacy chain launched a free diabetes resource center at one of it Upper West Side stores, at Broadway and West 63rd Street. Through a partnership between Duane Reade and the Laboratory Corporation of America, patients are also able to have lab tests done at 19 locations citywide.

"It's a huge convenience to people in New York City," Duane Reade's vice president of pharmacy and business development, Bob Storch, said. "We want to make Duane Reade pharmacy a destination for New York City residents. And to become a destination, we want to offer the full-spectrum of health and wellness initiatives."