Lakeview Pharmacy
Written by: Olivia Springsteen and Alix Fogarty
Photography/Videography: Megan Vittone
Interviewer/Editor: Emma Foley
Many small businesses both big and small have had to make changes to keep their staff and customers safe due to the coronavirus pandemic. Pharmacies are leading the way in providing services to their customers. One example is Lakeview Pharmacy in downtown Racine.
Lakeview Pharmacy is located at 516 Monument Square in Racine, Wisconsin. They specialize in pharmaceutical and holistic medications. As a result of the pandemic the pharmacy has had to make changes to support CDC guidelines and keep their patients and customers safe.
Lakeview Pharmacy is owned and operated by pharmacist Pete Ciaramita, who has over 40 years of experience in the pharmacy industry. The rest of the pharmacy team is composed of five pharmacists that work to ensure their patients receive the best possible care. The pharmacy manager, Megan Haapanen, has numerous roles as the team leader.
Haapanen has been a part of the team since 2009 and started as a staff pharmacist. She has now been the pharmacy manager for over five years. A typical day for Haapanen consists of anything from hiring new staff, to working on development and communication, or finances, and some days she does social media marketing. Haapanen stays educated by taking courses and following all guidelines with her staff to ensure that she is up to date on her education.
A recent study published by the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America (PNAS), focused on the effect the pandemic has on small businesses. After surveying over 10,000 small businesses, PNAS found that at least 43% of all small businesses were temporarily closed during the pandemic which led to employment of workers to be down by 40%. Therefore, even though Lakeview Pharmacy was open at a lesser capacity, they were still hit with financial complications from the pandemic.
When asked, “How has COVID-19 impacted your work?” Haapanen responded with “How has COVID-19 not impacted my work?”.
She then goes into further detail about how she must maintain the health and safety of her staff as well as the public by keeping up with current CDC guidelines. As a result, they have started to offer curbside pickup for prescriptions. Moreover, they have waived the delivery fee to homes, assisted living facilities, and healthcare facilities. Therefore, they can ensure multiple ways to access prescriptions that customers may need.
At Lakeview Pharmacy, Haapanen ensured that the staff “Were wearing masks before the mandate.” This reinforced their ideals of keeping themselves and the community safe.
Lakeview is now administering the COVID-19 vaccine. Haapanen elaborates that they first started offering the vaccine to select demographics in late January. The vaccine first became available first to persons 65 years and older, then it became available to essential workers, and is now currently open to anyone 16 years or older.
Haapanen claims that offering the Pfizer vaccine was “a whole new learning curve.”
The process to schedule a vaccine begins by signing up for an appointment slot for both doses (2 in total) on their website and ends with a fully vaccinated patient walking out of the pharmacy 3 weeks later. If a patient does not have access to the internet, they can either call the pharmacy to schedule an appointment or schedule it in person at the store.
When asked to share what makes Lakeview Pharmacy unique, Haapanen proudly said: “First and foremost it is just the level of customer service that we provide to our patients… Patients that come into Lakeview, they are a person (and are not) a number. They are a person; they are an entity. They are somebody that needs help, and we are there to do whatever we can to help them improve their health. Most of the patients that come here, we know them by name.”
Lakeview is one of the last independent pharmacies to remain in business after 40 years of serving the greater Racine community. Being independent allows for that level of customer service that Haapanen spoke about.
In this link there is more information pertaining to the survey that was mentioned above about small businesses and the issues the pandemic has caused them.
The impact of COVID-19 on small business outcomes and expectations | PNAS
Below is a link for your viewing to learn more about Lakeview Pharmacy and the struggles, that they have faced with administering COVID-19 vaccinations.
