In celebration of National Pharmacy Week and to honor the incredible achievements and impacts pharmacy professionals make in the field of healthcare, we are sharing personal stories from some of our own pharmacy team members.
Following a ten-minute technical glitch (on my end), I am finally able to connect with the friendly, amiable voice on the other end of my video chat. Enrique Najera, PharmD, introduces himself, and I feel like I am speaking to an old friend. Enrique is the Pharmacy Manager and Pharmacist in Charge (PIC) at the Retail Pharmacy for Gerald Champion Regional Medical Center (GCRMC). There have been rave reviews about his customer service and his ability to make everyone feel seen and welcome. My interaction is no different. He listens attentively to my questions and responds equally.
Since the customer-centric Najera took over as PIC, patient volumes for Champion Retail have more than doubled and customer satisfaction scores have skyrocketed. “Enrique has even received attention from our board members. One recently told me to never let Enrique go,” says Margie Burns, GCRMC Director of Pharmacy, “He’s so focused and driven by customer service and making sure our patients are taken care of.”
As a boy growing up with his mother and twin sister in Mexico, Najera watched his grandfather care for young patients as a pediatrician. His admiration for his grandfather’s dedication to quality care and his love for chemistry led him to a future in Pharmacy. After acquiring his associate degree and a successful PCAT Exam, Najera enrolled in the Pharmacy Program at Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center School of Pharmacy. While he worked hard in pharmacy school, he spent his time off helping his father with the family’s Travel Tour Bus business. “Customer service is big in my Dad’s family. I learned the value of good customer service and how a bond through it can create new customer opportunities,” Najera says. This drive and attention to the value of customer connection reflects in his work. “When a patient is being discharged, they do not expect people to be nice, but if you [a provider] can find a connection, even a smile can go a long way to make someone feel like they are a priority, “explains Najera.
For Najera, customer service does not stop at the pharmacy counter. “I want my staff to know their value. I tell them ‘Family first’ and want them to take care of their minds and bodies so that they can portray positivity to our patients,” Najera says. He believes in a top-down approach and works hard to help grow and instill this same patient forward drive in his own team. “I try to tell our staff to remember the Golden Rule (a CompleteRx Covenant) and the impact that can be made from a simple acknowledgement of a ‘hi’ or ‘hello’ when someone walks up to our pharmacy,” Najera continues, “a positive attitude can make a big difference.”
And what a difference Enrique has made. Over his short time as PIC, Najera has implemented new, patient focused systems allowing for more efficient lines of communication between the retail pharmacy and their patients. “We have a lot of tech savvy patients, and we wanted to offer a more time saving way to be informed about their prescriptions – the text message system has provided this,” Najera says. And this is just one piece of his customer-centric approach which continues to result in an increase in patient volumes.
We would like to thank and recognize Enrique Najera, Pharmacy Manager, for the incredible work he and his team continue to do at GCRMC and we wish them all a Happy National Pharmacy Week!
by: Rachel Rahm, Marketing Manager, CompleteRx
