CVS Health will apply its experience with onsite flu vaccination and COVID-19 testing to its new role as partner in the federal government’s COVID-19 vaccination efforts targeting long-term care facilities, Omnicare President Jim Love told McKnight’s this week.

When a future COVID-19 vaccine is approved, parent company CVS Health will deliver and administer the first phase of vaccines to long-term care residents in participating facilities, with its Omnicare division playing a “major role,” the company said. Omnicare currently provides pharmacy services to more than 10,000 long-term care facilities. 

The goal is to make the COVID-19 vaccination program “as seamless and efficient a process as possible for any long-term care facility that chooses us,” Love said in an email. The company will work directly with the facility operators to set up workflows “similar to our flu clinic program, so we can execute with the operational excellence that takes the burden of logistics off of staff and allows them to focus on [resident] care and other priorities.”

Omnicare’s onsite flu vaccine program, which began in 2016, is expected to complete clinics at an estimated 8,000 facilities this flu season, Love said.

“In 2019, these onsite vaccination clinics were operating with 92% customer satisfaction,” he noted.

In 2020, CVS Health also has administered more than five million COVID-19 tests, and expects to administer nearly 18 million flu shots, he added.

“With patients in nursing homes and other long-term care facilities uniquely at risk for complications from COVID-19, it is our priority to protect this vulnerable population,” Love said. 

Walgreens, which owns long-term care pharmacy services provider Pharmerica, also is a partner in the federal long-term care COVID-19 vaccination initiative.