Summary
Rawan Sam
Summary.docxIntroduction
The CVS implies Convenience, Value, and Service. It is an American based health and pharmaceutical center located along the Woonsocket, Rhode Island in the United States. It acquired its name back in the year 1996 after the change of ownership from Melville to the current owner Ryan Tom who is the CEO of this company, according to (Feldman.et.al.2018) the name comes after their desire to offer medical services to people in a convenient and valuable manner making it the one of the largest pharmacies in the US. Their mission is to give a high quality, safe, affordable and easily accessible services in health and pharmacy striving to value the quality of human life according to (Bachyrycz.et.al.2017).
In its operation it offers a series of services to its customers in a convenient way that leads to customer satisfaction, such services include prescribing drugs, over-the-counter drugs, beauty products, cosmetics, convenience foods and even provided an online platform to supplement their services. Its link to the government which pays for the outpatients also makes it the most convenient health center utilized by even government officials. According to (Meyerson.et.al.2018), some of the best services offered apart from medication are the guidance and counseling where patients suffering from trauma and mental stress are first given counseling by the experts in this health center.
Company Overview & History
CVS Health is a retail pharmacy that was founded in 1892 on humble beginnings. According to their website, CVS Health first began as a single store in the small town of Lowell, Massachusetts in 1892. The store was co-owned by the Goldstein brothers & Ralph Hoagland and sold health/beauty products to the local residents of Lowell. Over 126 years, the once small company grew to a pharmaceutical conglomerate that is now worth $65.5 billion and employs over 246,000 people. The once small company now dominates the retail pharmaceutical market with over 9,800 retail stores and over 68,000 retail network pharmacies in the US and parts of South America., which serve approximately 5 million people per day. The company also boasts over 1,100 MinuteClinic locations and over 37 million patient visits so far. Even after all those visits, CVS Health has managed to maintain an impressive 95% customer satisfaction rate.
Under current CEO Larry J Merlo, CVS Health has made a move into the health insurance market with the acquisition of insurance giant Aetna for $69 billion. This in theory will help CVS Health streamline their interactions between pharmacy & insurance, giving them a competitive edge in both sides of the business. This is a smart & strategic move, as Aetna customers will now be directed to CVS to get their prescriptions filled. This helps give CVS a leg up on their main competitor, Walgreens.
CVS Health has also made a strategic move toward integrating pharmacy with health care clinics, through its creation of over 1,100 MinuteClinic locations in North America. This integration of the service & drug sectors will allow for more efficient movement of pharmaceuticals from doctor to patient, at a reduced cost for both the drug & insurance companies alike. In the end this allows the big pharma companies to move more drugs to the general population, faster & cheaper than before.
Through strategic move like this, CVS Health has managed to cement its name as one of the top pharmacies for quite a long time. They the company doesn’t disclose much about their future plans, I expect to see more mergers/acquisitions within the health insurance/care sector in the future. These company relationships have the potential to be very profitable to CVS stakeholders, as they allow CVS to reduce costs and streamline transactions between big pharma companies & patients -- meaning revenue gains for the company.
Main Products, Services, and Competitors
The main competitor of CVS health is Walgreens, followed my Express Scripts, and Rite Aide. CVS scores first in overall culture score rank, gender score rank and diversity score rank. Gender Score rank is 65/100 which tracks how positively women rate their experience at CVS health. The Diversity score is 68/100 which tracks how diverse employees rate their time at CVS health. The overall culture score came in at 63/100 which ranks how comfortable the environment in CVS health is. CVS has almost 10,000 retail stores where as Walgreen has more than 8,100 stores. Walgreens is in the process to acquire Rite Aide, if the deal goes through they will combinedly have over 12,000 stores. The CVS health company has an amazing website with all the information you would be looking for at
Code of Ethics
The code of ethics focuses on taking care of those we serve, acting with integrity, respecting colleagues, interacting with others, doing the right thing, maintaining trust, and holding ourselves accountable. Their competitor Walgreens focuses their code of ethics on the “four-way test” this is summed up with the questions is it the truth, is it fair to all concerned, will it bring goodwill and better friendship, and will it be beneficial to all concerned. The two code of ethics focuses on the same principle of making sure everyone involved stays happy and all is fair.
CVS Health has the right idea not only are they focused on the customers they are also focused on the employees. This is important because without the Employees their isn’t anyone to help the customers. Even though there is an abunce of people to employe you will never be able to secure long term reliable employees which is important to run a business. Walgreens missed out on this point by focusing the majority of there key points on the consumer instead of the workers. CVS health has almost all the key points they need to cover inorder to have a successfully running health program.
I believe a big point both companies are missing in their code of ethics is a privacy policy. HIPAA (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996) required the secretary of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services to put in place regulations protecting the privacy and security of certain health information. The general rules of HIPAA are “Ensure the confidentiality, integrity, and availability of all e-PHI they create, receive, maintain or transmit; Identify and protect against reasonably anticipated, impermissible uses or disclosures; Ensure compliance by their workforce” as stated in HHS.gov.
Mission Statement
The mission statement of CVS Health is “Above all else … our mission is to improve the lives of those we serve by making innovative and high-quality health and pharmacy services safe, affordable and easy to access”. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://cvshealth.com/about/purpose-statement The mission statement of CVS state that the company is not just in the business to make money. The mission statement states that the company wants to make their patients a top priority. The mission statement of the company also emphasizes the company’s values as they aim to make healthcare more accessible to as many people as possible.
The mission statement of the company’s main competitor Walgreens is “We will treat each other with respect and dignity and do the same for all we serve. We will offer employees of all backgrounds a place to build careers. We will provide the most convenient access to healthcare services and consumer goods in America. We will earn the trust of our customers and build shareholder value.” https://news.walgreens.com/fact-sheets/vision.htm Walgreens mission statement is a bit more complex then that of CVS Health. Walgreens seems to go into more depth and list each facet of their business in their mission statement. I believe that since they have done this it makes the mission statement more clear to the reader.
As the reader can see the mission statements are very similar abet Walgreens mission statement is a bit longer than CVS’s. The two companies mission statements are comparable as both companies strive to make healthcare access more available to their customers. Both CVS and their competitor Walgreens make it clear that they are an ethical company through their use of language and word choice in their mission statements.
Social Responsibility and Sustainability
CVS Health takes social responsibility quite seriously. The company founded the CVS Health foundation which provides communities with grants to assist in improving their healthcare infrastructure. CVS health has also taken steps to combat the opioid epidemic. Thus far the CVS Foundation has given several grants to communities to help them work towards preventing the opioid epidemic from spreading.
The company also pays their workers a minimum wage of 11 dollars per hour this is 3.75 higher than the minimum wage in Pennsylvania. This was recently implemented by the company as they had an increase in earnings. This is a great example of social responsibility, while many companies would have only distributed the extra earnings to the shareholders CVS instead distributed some of them to the employees.
Recently CVS health has become much more sustainable they have reduced their fleets yearly travel by upwards of one million miles. They were able to do this through improved computer navigation systems. This is a great example of how the company is working towards becoming more environmentally friendly. The company has also recently made great strides to reduce the carbon footprint of their products packaging. They have collaborated with the manufactures of their products and together they have reduced the amounts of materials used in packaging and have implemented using some green alternatives.
In addition to the topics mentioned above CVS health also has partnered up with the American Cancer Society. CVS health has donated upwards of ten million dollars to the American cancer society. They have partnered with the American Cancer Society to provide them financial assistance to help fund cancer research.
Summary and Group Conclusions
