COVID-19

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Hi, this is Joe McKamy, General Manager of Marcrom’s Pharmacy and Wellness Center, and what I’m about to share with you could literally save you thousands of dollars over the next few years.

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What I’m going to share with you is Marcrom’s Preferred Customer Discount Club. You may not have heard of it, but it’s where you can get generic prescriptions for around a dollar per week.

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Here are the details of the program. First of all, prescriptions — we’ve got over 330 medications that you’re going to be able to get. Those are generic medications for around a dollar per week, our lowest

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price on other generic prescriptions and brand name prescriptions. Some people use this program instead of their health insurance. You’re also going to

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have access to your local hometown pharmacists that know you. This is so important in healthcare, to make sure that you have people that know you that are also part of this community. I know

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that’s the kind of people that you want to do business with. Special member perks — you’re going to find out about sales before other people do, you’re going to receive special treatment in the store, you’re going to

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have reduced pricing on our wellness center, you’re going to have some special members-only offers, and when you sign up the first time you’re going to receive over $50 worth of coupons.

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This is one of the best parts of the program. Whether you use the prescription side or not, there’s a rebate program. You’re going to earn

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rebates on purchases — all your purchases, including prescriptions used on the program or on your insurance. You’re going to earn rebates on gift items and

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your over-the-counter items, which are things like your allergy medications, Tylenol, ibuprofen, things like that. Those rebates can be used on retail items. So basically, the way it works,

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you’re going to purchase things here, you’re going to earn points, and you’re going to use those points to purchase your gift items, your over-the-counter items, and more.

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So you’re asking, how do I get started? We’ve got a special offer for you this month. Normally our club costs up to $30 for a family for a year, but from now

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until October 31st, club membership is free if you bring in the postcard you received in the mail, and if you get signed up by October 31st, that means

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you’re going to get a whole year for free. Now, our current members — I don’t want to cut you out of this deal. If you bring the postcard in, we’re going to extend your membership by a whole year.

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So take a few minutes, fill out the form below. It won’t cost you a thing. You’re going to get $50 in coupons just for filling out the form below. So go ahead

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and get signed up for our Preferred Customer Discount Program today. It’s going to save you money over time, I promise. We look forward to having you as

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a member of our Preferred Customer Discount Program, where you get generic prescriptions for around a dollar per week. Thanks, we hope to see you soon.

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Alright, it looks like we’re live. Thank you guys for being here with us. I want to make this an informative meeting. It is going to be informal, though — we’re just going to talk about a few of the issues

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surrounding COVID-19. Jon McKamey, I’m the general manager at Marcrom’s Pharmacy. I’ve been here 15 years now. It’s kind of

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crazy to think about how time flies by. Definitely the craziest thing that I’ve seen in my time in healthcare. And then

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with us tonight we have three of our pharmacists that you guys in the community all know and love, hopefully.

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People can hear us right now and that kind of thing. So we are recording this, so if you have buffering issues or

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you can’t hear us or that kind of thing, hopefully you can tune in to the recording later. Now, like I said, we have

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three of our pharmacists — the pharmacists that you know, love, and trust. Did you know that pharmacists are

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some of the most trusted healthcare professionals? And they’re definitely some of the most accessible

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healthcare professionals. I can say this because I’m not a pharmacist — I can brag on our team here. Because

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how many other medical professionals do you just get to walk in and say, “Hey, I need to talk to the pharmacist”? I mean, it’s just not

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common. And these folks make themselves readily available to you on a regular basis, and that’s

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what they’re doing tonight. They’re making themselves available to you to share, more than anything, some general information. I know when our

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president or when other people stand up at podiums and you hear them say things, you kind of wonder, well, what’s that

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about? Or is it legit? And what should my level of concern be? And so our pharmacists are going to share

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some of the things that they’ve learned. Now, they’ll be the first to tell you that this is new — this is different. So we

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don’t have a vast amount of knowledge on it yet. But with that said, based on their experience in the healthcare profession, they’re going to be able to

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share with you some things that are going to be really helpful. And they’re going to be hopeful as well. We have with

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us Richard — you guys know and love Richard. He’s been with us the longest here. Richard has been with us for twenty-four years and has been practicing

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pharmacy for 28 years. Not the longest? Yeah, Kim was the longest. Oh yeah, Kim’s been here the longest, that’s right. Alright,

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so he’s practiced a couple more years, but Kim has actually been a part of the Marcrom’s family for 26 years. So we

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have Kim here with us. And Michael is just the mere youngster — only 13 years, right?

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13 years is a long time to be practicing pharmacy and being in the healthcare profession. And I

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think they would agree that this is one of the craziest things they’ve ever seen and been a part of. And so they wanted to be able to share with you

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tonight how to work through it. So before we get into some of the more medical-related

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items, I wanted to address some things from the pharmacy standpoint — from a practical, day-to-day, what’s

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going on here. So first of all, as the general manager and as I deal with those kinds of things, it makes sense —

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I’m the numbers guy. And so I want to work through some numbers with you that we put together from

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what we feel are trusted resources. So we’re going to use some round numbers just to make the math easy. Some

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of you are out there going, “Is this really a big deal? Should we really be sheltering in place? Should

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we really be doing all these things and taking all these precautions?” And here’s the thing — from what I know, and they’ll speak

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more to you from a more educated perspective than what I’ve been able to

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gather — but from what I can tell, work with me on these numbers here.

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There are approximately 360 million people in the United States. The numbers would suggest that one out of four

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people will get this new virus. Now, don’t be necessarily alarmed

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because just because you get it doesn’t mean that you’re going to die.

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Or get sick, or even get really sick. You could be a silent carrier. So —

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90 million people. If you do the math, that means 90 million people will actually get this virus. And of those 90 million,

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they are suggesting that about 20 percent will end up needing to be

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hospitalized. So if you do the math on that, that’s about 18 million people

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that need to be hospitalized. Now, that doesn’t mean they’re going to go to the hospital to die — that just means that they’re going to end up in the hospital, and

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most of them are going to get out. Most of them are going to recover. But the point of all this — trying to slow the spread — is our

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healthcare system can’t handle 18 million people in the next three to four to six weeks ending up in the hospital. And so

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if 90 million people are going to get it, and if 18 million people are going to end up in the hospital — if we can slow

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that curve, if we can keep it from happening all at once, that’s what we’re trying to do. And that’s the whole goal

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of slowing the spread of the virus. Is it overkill? Maybe. It very well could be. And here’s

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the kind of good news and bad news — if it is overkill, we’ll never know. We’ll never know if it was overkill or

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not. But if we don’t act, we’ll find out for sure whether it was or not. And if

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acting could have helped, we’ll be really sad about it. So it’s always better to take action. That’s the numbers side of me

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when I’ve taken a look at all this. And so I hope that helps you understand a little bit as to why we’re trying to use that phrase of

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flattening the curve. And by the way, you’ll notice we’re in four very different areas of the pharmacy tonight. We’re all actually at the pharmacy — we’re

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practicing our social distancing. So with that said, what are we doing here at Marcrom’s

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on a practical level? So one of the things we’ve done — we’ve actually split our staff into two different teams so

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that if one team has somebody infected, we can better make decisions on who needs to be here, who needs to be at work,

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and who doesn’t need to be at work. So we’ve made that change for the short term in order to help protect our staff and to protect you as our patients. If

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you’ve been in the pharmacy in the past week or so, you’ve noticed we’ve put up the plexiglass screens in our lobby. As

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of right now, we’ve decided to keep our lobby open. Most folks are using the drive-thru, so we very rarely

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have a lot of people actually in the store right now. So between the low number of people in the store, combined

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with things like the plexiglass shields and things like that, we feel like we’re doing a pretty good job. And combined with our cleaning efforts, we feel

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we’re doing a good job of trying to protect everybody involved. Because we really want to protect both our

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employees and our patients. So the other thing is, if you do decide to come into the store, I would encourage you to

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notice right when you walk in — there are numbers on the floor, and those numbers designate where you need to

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stand so that you keep distance from everybody else that’s in the pharmacy. So as you come in, we’ve got one,

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two, three, four, five, six. And when person number one goes up to be checked in, person number two should move to

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number one, person number three should go to number two, and so on and so forth. It’s really not been a big issue because we just don’t

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have a ton of people in. Again, most people are going through the drive-thru. We’ve also placed an order and been given permission by

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the FDA to begin actually making hand sanitizer. We have Marcrom’s compounding — we’re a compounding pharmacy — and that enables us to do things like that. And so in a time

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of need like this, we’re able to go above and beyond, and that’s what we plan to do. So we have the supplies on order. They can’t

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tell us exactly when they’re going to be here, but as soon as we’re able to make that hand sanitizer and get it to the

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public, we’ll definitely have that out there for you guys. So I wanted to mention that. What can you do as it

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relates to your engagement with Marcrom’s Pharmacy? The pharmacists are going to talk to you in a minute about what you can do from a healthcare

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perspective. But from a practical level, what can you do to help your experience at Marcrom’s Pharmacy through this time? What’s interesting about that is the things that I’m going to mention —

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they’re actually things that you can do that will help your experience at Marcrom’s Pharmacy all the time. So here are a few things. Use our texting service.

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If you have not received an email or text about that, we have a texting

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service. By the time we’re done, I’ll make sure that we share that text number. It’s not a regular number — there’s a special number. It comes right into our

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pharmacy system. Use that service. And if you use that service, it comes right into our pharmacy system —

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it saves you a phone call, saves you time, and helps us serve you more efficiently. With that said, one great place to use that texting number is if

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you end up at our drive-thru. And as you can imagine, our drive-thru can get pretty backed up right now especially — and other times as well. And we

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recognize that. You can use that texting number to shoot us a quick text and say, “Hey, it’s Richard. I’m out

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here in the drive-thru. I’m here to pick up and I’m four or five cars back.” So that will let us know to go

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ahead and make sure that we’re prepared for you when you get to the window, and that should help expedite things. So again, use that going forward.

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Use our online web portal and our app. You’ve got our website, marcromspharmacy.com, and you can see how to use those

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things. Our app has undergone some changes over the past month or so. And for Android users, there

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are some definite challenges right now with it closing automatically. They’re working on that — they tell me there’s going to be a fix for that very soon. In

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the meantime, any device that has a web browser can use the web portal. So you can still use the web portal

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right from your phone. And that web address is patient.rxlocal.com.

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Make sure you get that as well. Here’s a huge one, and this will help you at any given time. I think there’s a

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misconception in pharmacy that you really aren’t supposed to call your prescriptions in until you’re

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out. And that’s kind of the way that people have been trained in the past. It would help your experience if

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you give us about two business days. It doesn’t take that long to fill your prescriptions, but you never know what kind of issues we might run into — whether it be insurance issues, whether it be stock

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issues, all kinds of other things. So if you give us a couple of days ahead of time, it’ll expedite your process. We’ve

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been tracking wait times, and the folks that call their prescriptions in a day or two ahead of time — their wait times are significantly shorter than folks

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that just walk in and ask for things to be filled. Are you fine to do that? Absolutely, we’ll definitely take care of you at any point. Richard was raising his hand — yes?

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I’d like to say something also. I had a patient call us today, Joe, about calling in early. Regarding controlled substances, we

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still fill only one day early on the 30-day supply, whatever it may be. So there was a misunderstanding about what that was about. It’s still fine to call

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those in — we can still get them ready whenever the time comes around. Just don’t think that you can’t call us until a day early. It’s still

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fine to let us know ahead of time so we can get it going — just processing until the proper date. So that was a little confusing thing today. Perfect —

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that’s why I need more than just me talking. Absolutely — good point.

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The final couple of things — one is, pay attention to our updates. So we’ll be sending out regular emails, texts,

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social media messaging, and that kind of thing. Pay attention to that as we evolve through this process with everyone else. And finally, the last thing is this —

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there have been some mixed messages as it relates to when you can get your medicine and

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when we can fill your medicine. Your insurance companies are saying, “Hey, we can do extended supplies — we’re allowing people to come in early,” and

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that kind of thing. I would just encourage you to consider using only 30-day supplies right now, because we

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don’t know how it’s going to affect things as it relates to

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prescription supply. We don’t think it’s going to have a huge impact, but we do know that it could potentially have an impact. I have two

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words for you that can be proof of that — toilet paper. So if everybody runs out and

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all of a sudden wants a 90 or 180-day supply of their meds because their insurance will allow it, that’s going to negatively impact other folks’ medication

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supply. So I’m kind of reminded — and I know I’ve talked too long, Richard left — I’m reminded of the movie

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It’s a Wonderful Life, where they’re going in and trying to figure out how much they can gather to get by. And that’s the

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kind of situation we find ourselves in. And so I just ask you to consider having that mentality — having that attitude — not just with your prescriptions but

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really with everything as we move forward with this. So I’ve talked enough — you guys probably agree with that. I know that our pharmacists

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definitely do. So we want to talk about just a few different things surrounding the pandemic

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and the situation we’re in. And I just want to open it up to the pharmacists. What can you guys tell us about the

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virus itself? So one of the biggest things — and I think it’s a misconception — is that

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it’s a death sentence. Not to make light of the numbers, but I think the death rate is somewhere around one percent.

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Obviously every life is significant, but it is a low death rate. Obviously

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it is deadly — people are dying — but at a low rate. And I think we need to keep that in mind and keep it in

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perspective. And of course, I’m sure we’ve all heard — the older people,

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those 65 and over, and those with comorbid diseases like COPD and asthma, are more likely to be in that

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population. So if you’re young and healthy, there’s a good chance that you

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may not have symptoms — you may make it through it just fine. Most likely will. So

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that is, I guess, a common misconception.

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The coronavirus — one thing about it is it’s not entirely a new virus. The virus itself is new —

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it’s mutated. The virus has been around for a long time, but it has mutated and

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evidently has been able to mutate into a human virus. The SARS virus

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back in, I think, 2003 — that was a coronavirus, which again was a significant

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disease, but we were able to overcome it.

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With that thinking — the fact that we were able to overcome SARS — we’ve been able to develop immunizations and

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vaccinations for H1N1. Of course we all remember that from several years ago, and it keeps coming up in the news about

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H1N1 because of the political comparisons. But given that fact, Michael — what do you think about the potential for some type of immunization in the future, or some way that we’re

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going to be able to combat this thing? You know, it’s very likely. You mentioned H1N1 — we have a vaccine.

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You get your flu shot — you get that vaccine every year. You may not know it or realize it, but you do.

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We were actually talking about that in the pharmacy just today, and some of our employees didn’t

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realize that part of the flu shot is actually an H1N1 vaccination. I found that

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kind of humorous. Yeah, well, we had a little more time to develop that vaccine. But yes, I do

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believe there will be a vaccine — whether we’ll end up having to use it to

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the extent that we did with H1N1, I don’t know. But yes, I do think there will be a vaccine in the near future. And it may be —

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these viruses mutate, so just because we develop something now, the way I’m hearing

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about this virus, it may be smart enough to change later on. So it may be that we have to develop something new each year, just like the flu shot. Who knows what it’s going to hold. But I’m like Michael —

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I think there’s a lot of promise in getting this done. Now I think, just to put it in perspective —

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I don’t know how quickly that’s going to be out there, and you guys can chime in if you agree — to get something to market, it’s going to take some time.

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Safety testing. You can’t just put something together and put it out there and assume it’s going to be safe. They’ve got to make sure that it’s not only doing what it’s

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supposed to do, but it’s not doing something that they don’t want it to do as well. So I’m like Michael — I think it will be out. It may take a little longer. And

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if I’m not mistaken, I think they have developed vaccines, but again, they’re out there for safety testing.

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So that’s more of a long-term answer. And thinking about that — what about potential

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short-term solutions? We’re hearing a lot about hydroxychloroquine and

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azithromycin and that potential combination. What can you guys tell me about that? Well, let me share a little bit about that first. Hydroxychloroquine —

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if anyone watched Fox News last night, they interviewed someone who was doing miraculously better taking hydroxychloroquine

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while in the hospital. And I don’t want to downplay that — that is wonderful news. But I do think, again, with a medication,

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we’re going to see a lot of these positive results. And folks may have some side effects that may not be as popular to

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put on the news. I think we need to show both sides of the coin. I’m not a fan of using hydroxychloroquine right away.

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First of all, that actually — the drug’s trade name was Plaquenil. So it was originally used for malaria, and

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honestly, now what we use it for mostly is rheumatoid arthritis and lupus patients as well. Very

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effective. The patients we’ve got on it routinely swear by it — they love being on it. It helps them

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tremendously. Which is what caused a call today — someone just asked me, “Why can’t you

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fill my Plaquenil?” And our comment was, right now we can’t get it. As soon as things like the report

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last night — a positive report about that coming out — but we couldn’t get it before that. But if we could, I guarantee you

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this morning we would have been without it, because just think of our little microcosm here in Manchester, Tennessee — all across the country, people would be trying to buy this

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kind of thing. We’re working on that. That’s right. And I think next month we’ve got some hope of getting the powder in that we

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can use — right, absolutely. These guys are always on it. And I know they won’t always toot their own horns, but being a compounding pharmacy right here in Manchester, Tennessee, gives us such an advantage in times like this. Because we

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do have on order hydroxychloroquine powder that we’ll be able to utilize and potentially make

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some medications. And the FDA is also likely

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going to lighten the restrictions on compounding for a

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period of time if there are drug shortages. So the fact that we’re prepared and ready to do that —

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I’ve talked about this a lot — we stand on the shoulders of giants here at Marcrom’s Pharmacy. People that you know —

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Tom and Ray — forty years ago recognized, “Hey, we need to do things like this,” not knowing that

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this pandemic was coming. That we need to be prepared to take care of the people in Manchester and the

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surrounding areas. And we really are. That is something really unique about our pharmacy — there’s not

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a lot of compounding pharmacies around anymore. And that’s really sad. But we do service a

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lot of counties in our area. So we’re very fortunate that we compound here. Richard — sorry, Kim and I

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both cut you off. I was going to say — to add to that — and I want to be fair, I should say why I didn’t like hydroxychloroquine. Again, we hear this great, positive thing. Now

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Richard — you were saying no? No, I think it actually can be a good thing. There are studies going on. But in

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our medical community, one of the first things we take is our oath — to first do no harm. That’s always something I take seriously, to

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make sure that when people are getting this medication, we’re not causing more problems. Right now it’s only been anecdotal. There are some studies going on

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that show some promise, but they’re not controlled studies showing exactly how good this is. My biggest

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concern with hydroxychloroquine — and this is for everybody, even our folks taking it for arthritis who have been on it for a while and understand

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they can take it and everything’s okay — is the heart issues. Because there are some really bad arrhythmias, especially in

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combination with other medicines that can cause that as well. When we think of arrhythmias — what is that? That’s just an abnormal beat of the heart. But

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people sometimes hear about A-fib. Well, ventricular — the bottom part of the heart — when it beats too quickly, that’s actually what sometimes causes people to go into

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cardiac arrest. Ventricular fibrillation. I think this is a really serious issue, and with this medicine, that can happen — especially combining it with

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another one. And one of the things they’re talking about now too is azithromycin — that’s another medication they’re looking at. Well,

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those two can both independently cause that. It may be rare to cause it in both cases, but you put the two together — which they’re studying now —

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you’ve got a higher chance of it. And I’m much more in favor of this being used — and I think that’s where it’s going — in a hospital

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setting. Because if you start this medicine in the hospital, you’re on things to check your heart rate, you’re on EKG monitors, you’re on things

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that are going to keep an eye on this. And if it happens, we can stop it quickly. I really worry about the community where we work — where you’ve got someone,

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say, a physician who is under a lot of pressure right now because of what’s going on. One patient convinces them, “Hey, I need this

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medication.” And a provider who may not understand as much about how this is going to work writes the prescription,

25:44
and they take it in an outpatient setting. Well, no one’s there to monitor these things. They may not even think about this arrhythmia right away. They may

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just be having some shortness of breath, which may actually be a heart condition. So I’m really concerned about it being at the top of the list for treating it

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right now. I just think we need more studies. And I know time is of the essence — we’ve got to get these things done. So I’m not trying to completely negate it, but I do think it needs to be

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started in the hospital. Sure. Richard — one of the great things is that we were able to

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repurpose existing drugs to hurry up the process. Just think if we were having to study a

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brand new drug — we’d be years away. But this is a drug that we’ve had around that we know is safe for the most part. So the

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fact that we can repurpose a drug like that is pretty awesome. I agree — that’s right. And just to make a broader

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sweeping statement, I think that points to, for our patients, the whole idea — don’t go taking

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somebody else’s medicine, because you don’t know how you’re going to react to it. That’s why it’s important not to take other people’s medicine. We have

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patients who have been on hydroxychloroquine for years and it seems that they’re not going to have the heart issues, and we know that now. But now you hear, “Hey, hydroxychloroquine works — my granny’s got some in her cabinet, I’m going to go start taking some.” You just

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don’t know what’s going to happen. Right. Okay, good.

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Anything else about hydroxychloroquine from you guys? I think we’re good.

27:27
Alright. So I know we’ve heard a lot about this idea of slowing the spread. We talked about some of the numbers

27:36
earlier. What’s your guys’ advice about slowing the spread? Well, I think the government is right on it.

27:44
It seems like small, mundane things that we’re doing — like washing our hands frequently

27:51
and staying away from each other — whatever they’re telling us to do, it seems simple. But that’s exactly right — they’re simple, so let’s do them and slow the spread. I think that’s

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a great thing about infectious disease — slowing the spread of disease. You can slow it just by simple

28:07
things that we should be doing every day. I think the school closures are a good thing — that’s a huge part of

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a lot of people congregating at one time. All the sporting event cancellations — I think it’s all good. Staying at home — that’s probably one of the biggest things. We see it now on social

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media — “Stay at home, I stayed home for you, you stay home for me,” that kind of thing. And I do

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realize too that even though our life has been made more hectic down here because of what we need to do, I feel fortunate in a

28:50
different way now. I’m fortunate that we are still here to be able to help people, to service these people. So I understand it’s a hardship

28:58
when people have their own businesses and they’re not what they would consider necessary services — that’s probably debatable as to what

29:05
“necessary” means. But for whatever the definition of that is, as much as we can — if we don’t get together, this disease —

29:14
it’s a communicable disease. If you don’t get together, it’s not going to propagate. So I think that’s one of the biggest things. And I know I’ve got a teenage son — it’s

29:22
hard to get people to understand this. “None of us around here have any kind of condition — we feel great. How can this be

29:30
such a bad thing? Is it really happening? Are these stories on the East coast and West coast — is it really happening, or is TV just

29:38
spinning things?” Folks, it’s happening. We’ve got to heed what they say because it’s going to come here. And the more care

29:45
we can take now, the quicker this is going to pass. And the flatter the curve is going to be. So for those folks

29:53
who do need medical care — yeah. For those folks,

30:01
it’s here. And likely — we don’t have a reported case in our county yet, right, Michael? As far as I knew,

30:10
that’s still correct. Yeah. But it’s here — the likelihood of it

30:17
not being here is slim. So for those people that makes super anxious and super

30:24
worried — what would you guys say to them? I think just keeping

30:31
it in perspective and knowing that if we do things right and we’re taking these precautions, there’s a

30:40
good chance that individuals will make it through it. Definitely communities are going to get through it.

30:49
We just have to do things the right way and just stay calm. And prayer — obviously prayer is a big thing

30:58
that everybody can do. And for the numbers guy — yeah, whenever I go to

31:06
an amusement park, do I think about the odds? I get on that ride and then I think to myself, “What are the chances of something happening?” I don’t hear about reports of people dying

31:13
riding roller coasters, so it kind of calms my fear. Well, again, we’re talking about this death rate — you can still get

31:20
sick. But a death rate of around 1% right now — if people can think in those terms, if you are very analytical like I am, that

31:28
to me is comforting. To know that the vast majority of people are going to get through this just fine. We still do need to have treatments

31:38
available. This kind of thing can still cause a lot of respiratory issues, and we’ve got some over-the-counter medicines to treat those kinds of things

31:46
as well. So we’ve got some things to treat it with. It’s just these really severe cases that we’re worried about — and that’s the ones we need to be concerned

31:55
about. But also, if we do get these cases — and I think it probably is in Manchester to some degree, we just haven’t seen it tested or

32:03
symptomatic — just know that whenever these things do pop up, let’s treat them like it is. And

32:12
it’s probably not going to be one of

32:21
the really bad cases. Probably. And there are things — medication that really helped them a lot. That was something I did mention

32:29
a while ago. The call today — about what to do about this kind of thing. And since we can’t get it now — whether it be to help treat the COVID

32:36
virus, or lupus, or whatever it may be — the only thing we can do at this point is to have them call their physician and see

32:44
about changing to something else. They’ve got lots of medicines for each of these conditions. This is a very good one for it — it may be one of the

32:52
better ones out there. But it’s like I say — you can’t get it, you can’t get it. And I would much rather treat with something that maybe

33:01
is not quite as effective than to do without anything. And again, like Michael said, I want to focus on keeping calm. Just

33:09
realize that doctors are going to get a lot of calls about this. And we can help if we need to as well. I can call them and talk with the physicians and

33:16
say, “Hey, here are some other options we might try.” We can look at the chart — maybe if they’ve changed doctors, we may have better records to see if they’ve tried something in the past. So we can

33:24
communicate with them as well to get some alternatives. But I think they do need to be proactive about that. If you’re taking that medication now and you’re

33:32
watching this, I would go ahead and call the doctor right away. Say, “Look, I may have some now, but I probably can’t get it the next time it comes up. So what can we do

33:39
going forward?” Yeah. I think that’s a good point you make, Richard — just that your whole healthcare team

33:47
works together. We call the physicians to ask them about certain things, they call us about

33:55
certain things. And so it’s this whole team approach. So don’t hesitate to get involved in that process — we’re glad to help.

34:03
That’s right. That’s why we’re known as the drug experts. Not saying doctors don’t know the drugs, but that’s kind of our specialty. So

34:09
when it comes to that — yeah. So one thing that I’ve not heard a lot of people talk about

34:17
through this whole process — and Kim has been relatively quiet on the call, but

34:24
we’re really about to jump into her area of expertise. I can tell she’s ready to go. So she is

34:34
not holding back. This is our go-to expert on the holistic approach to

34:42
medicine and the body. And that’s her thing. So we’re so glad that she’s taken that role here at the pharmacy. And I really

34:51
would like to hear from you, Kim. I know a lot of people would too, because we’re not hearing this — what are the types of preventive measures that we can take

34:59
that could potentially help curb this individually? So let’s start with the

35:08
gut. You guys know I’m always really big about gut health — I talk about it all the time. Really, the gut is where our immune system

35:17
really resides. So when people are not having good gut function, good bowel movements regularly, or they’re having

35:25
irritable bowel — that’s an area that I always focus on with people. It doesn’t matter if we’re dealing with the coronavirus or not —

35:33
that’s always the first place I start with people. We want to work on the gut. We want to have healthy bowel movements. So with that said,

35:42
even in my own health journey, I have had lots of infections. And when we have

35:49
a lot of antibiotics, yes, that may help kill off some bacteria that’s causing some problems. But it’s not selective —

35:57
it can sometimes kill off the good bugs that we need in our gut as well. There’s a lot of data coming out about

36:04
what we call the gut the “second brain.” So I always tell people, if I have a happy, healthy gut, then I also have a

36:11
happy, healthy brain. And there are even links to the gut as far as Alzheimer’s and things of that nature. So

36:18
gut function is very important. Sometimes I ask people to use good quality probiotics that kind of help put

36:27
back some good bugs in the gut. You can also do that with your foods. Probiotics are important, but I also

36:35
talk about prebiotics, which are basically things that feed the bugs that are in your gut. If you’ve ever had a septic tank and you leave town,

36:43
sometimes you put a yeast packet in your toilet or something to help feed the bugs in the septic tank because it kind of

36:52
munches on them and helps break down what’s in there. Well, the same is true in your gut. We like prebiotic foods and even probiotics that have

37:01
prebiotics in them. And we have some really good quality probiotics here that I like to use that are out front. So gut

37:08
health is always a big one. I love bone broth. Bone broth really helps heal the gut. Sometimes when people are sick

37:15
they’re doing more soups and things of that nature, so bone broth is really good — it has collagen in it that kind of helps heal the gut lining. So I’m all

37:25
about the gut. And of course, there are some supplements and things that we can take. Again, they don’t —

37:32
I think we were talking the other day — do they help kill off the coronavirus? I don’t know that we can say that right now. But we

37:40
definitely know that when we take these types of things, they support our immune system. And that’s what we

37:47
want. It’s not that we want to say we’re “boosting” it — we want to help our immune system modulate, or work

37:56
appropriately. So some of the things that I really like — one is vitamin A. It really

38:05
helps with a lot of immune system function. And then also vitamin D. I know you guys know that I’m a big advocate for

38:13
vitamin D. We use a ton of it here, and good quality vitamin D. So I’m always having to reorder that. And when

38:21
people come to me here in the pharmacy and I’m looking at labs, we have ranges of labs that we like. But I’m not

38:29
just looking for normal — I’m wanting optimal. And one thing I repeatedly see is that people

38:36
have low vitamin D. So we want to make sure that we have really good levels because that’s helping to set up

38:44
our immune system. I don’t know that we can definitively say that if you have a low vitamin D level you’re

38:52
going to get the coronavirus or something like that. But what we do know is that when we have better, optimal levels,

38:59
we’re just set up to win. We just do much better if we come in contact with things like that. Another one that I’ve already

39:07
had people asking for is vitamin C, or what we call ascorbic acid. The thing about that is it’s a

39:15
water-soluble vitamin, so you tend to excrete it out pretty quickly. But it also really helps with a lot of your

39:23
immune function — especially your white blood cells, which attack when you come in contact with certain infections and so forth. And that kind of supports

39:32
that function. Another one — and if you’ve listened or watched some of the news, they did bring this up about some of the

39:40
drugs that they were using to treat the coronavirus — one of the theories was that

39:48
it helped up-regulate the amount of zinc. And zinc is really great for immune function. Specifically, we have certain

39:57
cells like what they call natural killer cells and neutrophils, which are all things

40:04
that fight infection. And zinc helps up-regulate that. When I always tell people, there are about five

40:11
things that most Americans are deficient in — that includes things like magnesium, vitamin D, which we

40:19
already mentioned, fatty acids, minerals. But the other thing is zinc. And most people are usually deficient in zinc.

40:27
And with the Lose to Win program that you really promote — you know, eating really clean — but even if you eat clean and

40:36
organic, a lot of our soil today is really depleted of the minerals that we need. So sometimes we just have to

40:44
supplement, even if we’re eating really healthy. And another one that I thought was

40:52
pretty fascinating — there was some literature about melatonin, which most of us just think of as being for sleep.

41:00
But what we’ve seen is that it does help with immune function. And as we age, there’s a gland that

41:08
makes melatonin, and it kind of slows down as we get older. So we wonder if

41:16
in our elderly population, good melatonin levels could also be a part of helping them with their immune system —

41:24
if we possibly supplemented that. And our kids today — I wonder sometimes with all of the cell phones

41:33
and things that they’re using, and not going to sleep — that affects the melatonin levels. But melatonin —

41:40
if we have good, optimal levels of that as well, it’s just another thing in our toolkit that we can do to help

41:46
with our immune function, and just making sure that it’s working well so that if we do come in contact with something, we

41:54
can fight it off. So those are probably some of the big things that I would recommend out here.

42:03
And I hesitate to just name a certain dose — I usually like to talk to people or look at what they’re already taking before I just give a dose on something. But there are some different ways that we dose

42:18
some of these supplements when we’re dealing more with immunity. And of course we can help people when they come in here pick that out. And

42:26
of course, I’m a big believer in good quality supplements. Because we have some different sections — we have

42:34
some basic sections that you might find at just any regular pharmacy or other chain pharmacies. But then we also

42:41
have pharmaceutical grade supplements. And to me, there is a really big difference. If you use a better quality

42:49
supplement, you’re probably going to get more impact from it. And you’re probably going to ask me why that is. A lot of

42:56
the supplements we have contain fillers that are inflammatory to a lot of people. Food allergies is something I

43:05
deal with for people all the time. Give me a patient that has autoimmune disorders — they most likely have some type of food allergy that they didn’t

43:13
even know about. I did a food allergy test on myself here, and the things that came up —

43:20
things that I need to stay away from — for sure, gluten. But even things like egg whites. Who

43:28
would have thought of that? A lot of times when we talk about eggs, we say the white part would be better. But for me, I

43:35
have to watch flaxseed too. And usually flaxseed is considered healthy. Little things like that — things that are in a lot of the fillers that are in a lot of

43:44
supplements, like gluten and corn — we don’t want that in there. That’s inflammatory to a lot of people. That’s one reason why I

43:52
like pharmaceutical grade — they also tend to do more testing on their supplements, and they can really stand behind

44:03
their products. They’ve done studies on them as well. So —

44:11
interesting. And Richard said, “Wow, that was a lot!” Okay, so — and I’m reminded —

44:19
you’re talking about quality vitamins — I’m reminded of an article that came out several years ago

44:25
about how many different supplements they tested that were on major retailer

44:34
shelves. It said they had certain things in them, but when they tested them, they didn’t have any of it in there. And I’m not suggesting that they

44:44
purposely didn’t put it in there — what I’m suggesting is that it was put in there as an ingredient, but because of

44:52
the manufacturing processes, it destroyed all the efficacy of it. And what we’ve committed to doing

45:01
is making sure that we carry lines of vitamins, probiotics, and those kinds of things that are of quality and that we

45:11
believe you’re going to get the most impact from. Now — can you start taking some of these things? Let me

45:18
just go through — I’ll kind of recap what you said — probiotics, vitamin A, vitamin C, zinc, vitamin D, and melatonin. Those are

45:26
all some important things. And those types of supplements — from my

45:34
understanding, and Kim, you can correct me if I’m wrong — they’re not necessarily such that if you start taking them today, your immune system is just all of a sudden fixed,

45:42
right? It takes time for those things to develop. And so they may not protect you from the coronavirus right now, but they may help you

45:51
with the next round — or the flu, or the common cold, that kind of thing. So this is a time when we’re all reflecting on a

46:00
lot of different things. This is a really important time for all of us to reflect on our general health and what

46:07
we’re doing to make sure that we’re as healthy as possible. So any other final tips from you guys? Anything else?

46:15
If you want to learn more from Kim, definitely make an appointment — give the pharmacy a call. Kim is here, and you can tell

46:23
she loves to talk about it. It’s her thing. And I love that — she’s passionate about it. So any

46:31
final tips before we shut it down for the night? I would like — if you can touch on it, Joe — about the

46:38
30-day supply thing. It’s almost the equivalent of hoarding toilet paper. Yeah, you just touched on that — this is a bigger point right

46:47
now. Yeah, I think you had stepped away for a minute. I did talk a little bit about that. But just for folks — even though the insurance

46:55
companies are telling you that you can get longer day supplies or that you can come in really early — we just urge people not to do that. Just

47:03
to make sure that the supply chain for prescription medications is not disrupted. And that’s within your control.

47:10
And we’re going to do everything we can to make sure that we have everything you need. We’re going to do our absolute best to make sure that we have

47:18
it. We’re doing things here differently than we typically do to make sure that we try to do that. So absolutely —

47:24
but yeah, it’s worth mentioning again for sure. Rich, I just think we need to keep

47:36
doing these things because we do like

47:55
being together. And doing those things will help prevent the spread of this disease.

48:04
And I think we just need to keep that in mind and just keep on doing it. And I think it’s safe to say there’s not a

48:12
conspiracy out here — no one is going to gain from this by trying to keep us home. The smart folks at the CDC — they’re not

48:20
political, they’re not on one side or the other. I know a lot of people want to think that, but they are looking out for our best health. Whatever their guidelines are — that’s what we

48:28
need to do. Yeah. I just got a text that reminded me about something too. One of the things that I’ve seen — it’s kind of neat in our neighborhood — is there are

48:36
lots of people outside walking. Being active. So use this time to get active. Not only

48:44
is it going to help you mentally, it’s going to help you get healthier. And sweating — that’s one of the best things to do.

48:52
Just to sweat. And of course, I’m a big proponent of exercise and physical activity. Richard’s thinking of some

49:00
songs right now. Sweaty dancing around! I know, I know. That our community

49:08
appreciates you guys doing this. I appreciate you guys staying and doing this. I think it’s been super helpful and super informative for people to hear from local people who are so

49:16
knowledgeable on these things. So thank you guys for being willing to do this. I brag on you guys all the time — I believe we have the best staff in the world.

49:24
You guys are phenomenal and you really serve and take care of our community well. I know this isn’t the thing you love to do — going on videos and

49:32
things like that — but I know I’ve seen, and I’m seeing, some of the Facebook comments come in. And people are super

49:41
appreciative of you guys doing this. So I say thank you for them and for me. Michael mentioned something — I wasn’t sure exactly how we

49:48
were going to close this out. But Michael said something that I think would kind of encapsulate who I believe we are at

49:56
Marcrom’s — and really how we started. And so, I guess you can hang up the phone or however you’re watching this if

50:04
you want to. But I just think we should finish with a word of prayer. This is kind of off the cuff, so I’ll

50:12
lead us in a word of prayer and we’ll close the meeting for the night. Our God, we come before you and we

50:19
don’t know the purposes behind all of this. We just know that we hope

50:26
and pray that you be glorified through it — that people turn to you through this pandemic and this

50:34
tragic time. But that you would turn something good out of it, and we trust you in that. God, we pray for our

50:41
elected officials. We pray for people making decisions. We pray for all the people that are taking so much heat over this. We pray for the people who are sick.

50:50
We pray for the people who have contracted this. We pray for the people who are anxious over this. We pray for people who —

50:58
honestly, God, I pray for people who think this is absolutely nothing. I pray that they would have wisdom in this time as well. God, there are so many things

51:07
that we can pray for in this time. But more than anything, we pray that we would turn to you — that we would return to you —

51:15
and that you would be glorified through all of this. We praise you and we thank you. In Jesus’ name we pray, amen. Thank you guys for being here. And if you

51:23
missed some of this, we’ll have it recorded and we’ll make sure that you have the opportunity to watch it. So everybody have a good night, wash your hands, and don’t touch your

51:32
face. See you guys — good night.