wellconnected’s ‘allco’ platform to support New York pharmacies with social needs screening

wellconnected is thrilled to announce another exciting application of our ‘allco’ platform to serve the social needs of community members.

Led by the University at Buffalo Clinical and Translational Research Institute, a consortium of community-based pharmacies is set to adopt allco this spring to support assessments and referrals for their clients.

Pharmacy staff will conduct social needs assessments of people who come in for prescriptions or guidance using a custom ‘allco’ intake process. Those in need of assistance – from housing to food to mental health – will receive referrals to community-based organizations that specialize in that kind of care.

“Pharmacies are an important source of community support and this project will allow staff to guide people to places where they receive much-needed relief and help,” wellconnected CEO Duane Conners said. “They will use allco to leverage the social determinants of health risk assessments, which we know is an important step in improving the regional social care framework.”

allco won’t just be a referral mechanism for pharmacies. It will enable the documentation of this activity to assess the viability of the project and the potential for a larger rollout in subsequent phases.

The use of ‘allco’ to create a referral network and document referrals has led to extremely high ‘closed-loop referral rates’ with existing clients, showing how data-informed processes can dramatically improve community-based care.

wellconnected is an enterprise platform with the mission to improve social care through standardized case management, regional collaboration and the use of data to inform community care. Pharmacies are a key node in the healthcare continuum of any community and, for many people, a trusted source of support beyond the delivery of medicine and prescriptions.

That level of trust is a key to this project as it will allow pharmacy staff to ask questions about health-adjacent context such as living situations, finances and food. allco will then provide a standardized protocol for guiding people to care that may be necessary. Onboarding at various pharmacies will begin later this spring or early summer.