Meijer Joins Growing Group of Retail Pharmacies to

Integrate with MAPS to Prevent Opioid Abuse

Media Contact: LARA Communications 517-373-9280

Email: mediainfo@michigan.gov
December 19, 2017 Meijer is the latest retail pharmacy to integrate the new
Michigan Automated Prescription System (MAPS) into its existing pharmacy
management systems in pharmacy locations across Michigan. The integration
equips Meijer with a vital tool to combat the ongoing opioid crisis.
Earlier this year, Kroger, also with the help of Appriss Health, announced
integration with MAPS.
Meijer and Appriss Health are supportive partners that have worked relentlessly
to help LARA integrate the new MAPS into existing systems in order to help
address the opioid epidemic in Michigan, said Lt. Gov. Brian Calley. Meijers
integration will provide pharmacists with real-time information about potentially
harmful prescribing and dispensing trends and help pharmacists make better and
more informed decisions.
A $2.47 million appropriation from the state legislature gave LARA the
opportunity to begin replacing the old MAPS, which successfully launched on
April 4, 2017. Using $1.8 million remaining from the state appropriations and after
the Department received an additional $373,000 in a federal grant from the U.S.
Department of Justice, Calley along with Appriss Health announced on June 19,
2017 that the state would cover the full integration of MAPS into the clinical
workflow. Michigan health systems, physician groups and pharmacies have until
August 31, 2019 to complete the integration with the available funds.
Providers who integrate will also receive Appriss Healths NarxCare, a
comprehensive substance use disorder platform with powerful analytics for risk
assessment and patient support. NarxCare aggregates two years of historical
prescription data from providers and pharmacies, including quantities and active
prescriptions, and presents interactive, visual representations of the data.
The platform also provides tools and resources to enable prescribers, dispensers
and care teams to help patients and connect them to treatment if necessary.
In addition to being integrated with Michigans Prescription Drug Monitoring
Program (PDMP), MAPS, Meijer is also integrated with the state PDMPs in Ohio
and Indiana.
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Additional Information MAPS
The new MAPS provides the states prescribers with a user-friendly portal,
making it more efficient for practitioners to obtain information of controlled
substances and Schedule 2-5 drugs that have been dispensed. The MAPS portal
is administered by the LARAs Bureau of Professional Licensing.
Gov. Rick Snyder formed the Michigan Prescription Drug and Opioid Abuse Task
Force in June 2015 and one of their key recommendations was to update and
replace the problematic MAPS platform. The governor also established
the Prescription Drug and Opioid Abuse Commission to continue the work
initiated by the task force. In addition to the new system and the work of the
commission, the Snyder Administration along with a group of bipartisan
legislators, recently unveiled a comprehensive legislative strategy focused on
building on the states to tackle the opioid crisis that plagues our communities.
Benefits of the new MAPS include:

The new PMP AWARxE platform has the fastest response time in the drug
monitoring industry. Record lookups that once took up to 10 minutes now
are completed in seconds.
A dashboard provides patient alerts, recent request history and the ability
to maintain delegate user activity within the prescribers main account.
Patient report requests include seamless interstate data sharing. Patient
reports include prescription history, prescriber and dispenser information
that can all be provided in a complete summary.
Real-time data uploads occur during the day versus the current process of
batched data uploaded nightly.
Online tutorials are available for providers using the system for the first
time.

More information on the new MAPS can be found at the following resources:

MAPS AWARxE User Registration Guide

Bureau of Professional Licensing MAPS Resource page
Bureau of Professional Licensing MAPS Software Integration Resources
page