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About East Oregonian : E.O. (Pendleton, OR) 1888-current | View Entire Issue (Aug. 19, 2016)
NORTHWEST East Oregonian Page 2A Friday, August 19, 2016 In rural Oregon, trouble getting medication BEND — Murray’s Drug is a throwback to a simpler time. Opened in 1959 long before national drugstore chains and mail- order pharmacies dominated the prescription world, the family-owned business is still the only place in town the 1,200 residents of Heppner can ill a prescription. In fact, between their Heppner and Condon stores, pharma- cists John and Ann Murray, and their daughter, Laurie Murray-Wood, run the only brick-and-mortar pharmacies in all of Morrow, Gilliam, Sherman and Wheeler counties. “It’s hard to keep these pharmacies open six or seven days a week,” he said. “When we were raising our kids and Ann and I were the only pharmacists, we had two stores to cover, so ive days kind of became the norm.” As a result, Heppner is one of many towns across Oregon with limited access to prescription drugs. A recent analysis from Oregon State University suggests that the lack of pharmacy services may be boosting the rates of hospital readmissions among seniors, at great cost to both patients and the health care system. The study tallied the cumulative number of hours pharmacies were open in each primary care service area across Oregon, then compared those to readmission rates at local hospitals. In urban areas, with plentiful access to pharmacies, hospital readmission rates among patients over the age of 65 were lower, at about 14.7 percent of discharges. In rural areas, where phar- macies were open fewer hours per day, hospital readmission rates were a half percentage point higher at 15.3 percent. “That’s pretty signiicant consid- ering the number of patients that are admitted into hospitals in Oregon each year and when you translate that to the amount of money that’s being saved in reducing readmissions,” said Sarah Bissonnette, an OSU post-doctoral fellow and lead author of the study. Rural hospitals do what they can to help patients but are often limited in how much medication they can provide at discharge. Pioneer Memorial Hospital in Heppner has a drug room that supplies medications for inpatient or emergency room patients, said Pioneer CEO Bob Houser. “They can get most of their pharmacy ills here if they are sent home on a weekend when Murray’s Drug is closed,” he said. “The drug room in the hospital is not a retail pharmacy, but we are allowed to send home up to a three-day supply of drugs with the patient to use until the pharmacy is open.” But if patients need medications not stocked by the hospital, they may need to drive an hour to Hermiston to 211 S.E. Byers Ave., Pendleton 541-276-2211 333 E. Main St., Hermiston 541-567-6211 Ofice hours: Monday through Friday, 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Closed major holidays SUBSCRIPTION RATES Local home delivery Savings off cover price EZPay $14.50 41 percent 52 weeks $173.67 41 percent 26 weeks $91.86 38 percent 13 weeks $47.77 36 percent *EZ Pay = one-year rate with a monthly credit or debit card/check charge www.eastoregonian.com To subscribe, call 1-800-522-0255 or go online to www.eastoregonian.com and click on ‘Subscribe’ East Oregonian (USPS 164-980) is published daily except Sunday, Monday and Dec. 25, by the EO Media Group, 211 S.E. Byers Ave. Pendleton, OR 97801. Periodicals postage paid at Pendleton, OR. Postmaster: send address changes to East Oregonian, 211 S.E. Byers Ave. Pendleton, OR 97801. Single copy price: $1 Tuesday through Friday, $1.50 Saturday Copyright © 2016, EO Media Group SUNDAY Sunny and very warm Hot with plenty of sunshine 89° 55° 95° 62° MONDAY Sunshine and very hot Sunny and cooler but pleasant TUESDAY Delightful with plenty of sun PENDLETON TEMPERATURE FORECAST 97° 59° 82° 50° 82° 52° HERMISTON TEMPERATURE FORECAST 94° 47° 98° 58° PENDLETON through 3 p.m. yesterday TEMPERATURE HIGH LOW 95° 87° 106° (1897) 60° 57° 43° (1904) PRECIPITATION 24 hours ending 3 p.m. Month to date Normal month to date Year to date Last year to date Normal year to date 0.00" 0.07" 0.24" 7.39" 5.00" 8.23" HERMISTON through 3 p.m. yesterday TEMPERATURE Yesterday Normals Records HIGH LOW 97° 87° 105° (1967) 58° 57° 44° (1987) PRECIPITATION 24 hours ending 3 p.m. Month to date Normal month to date Year to date Last year to date Normal year to date 0.00" 0.05" 0.12" 4.99" 3.25" 6.07" SUN AND MOON Sunrise today Sunset tonight Moonrise today Moonset today Last New First 6:01 a.m. 7:56 p.m. 8:45 p.m. 7:29 a.m. Full Sep 1 Sep 9 Sep 16 Aug 24 86° 51° 86° 48° Seattle 97/62 ALMANAC Yesterday Normals Records 99° 61° Today Spokane Wenatchee 84/57 89/62 Tacoma Moses 94/53 Lake Pullman Aberdeen Olympia Yakima 91/53 84/47 88/58 95/52 93/54 Longview Kennewick Walla Walla 97/59 91/60 Lewiston 93/50 Astoria 91/58 88/59 Portland Enterprise Hermiston 100/66 Pendleton 84/49 The Dalles 94/47 89/55 97/58 La Grande Salem 87/46 103/61 Albany Corvallis 102/60 104/57 John Day 90/56 Ontario Eugene Bend 95/59 105/55 86/49 Caldwell Burns 93/56 92/45 Astoria Baker City Bend Brookings Burns Enterprise Eugene Heppner Hermiston John Day Klamath Falls La Grande Meacham Medford Newport North Bend Ontario Pasco Pendleton Portland Redmond Salem Spokane Ukiah Vancouver Walla Walla Yakima Hi 88 86 86 70 92 84 105 86 94 90 95 87 84 111 79 75 95 93 89 100 90 103 84 82 98 91 93 Lo 59 41 49 54 45 49 55 50 47 56 51 46 43 67 52 53 59 50 55 66 45 61 57 43 66 60 54 W s s s s s s s s s s s s s s s s s s s s s s s s s s s Lo 57 41 57 51 48 52 52 53 58 60 49 49 45 66 50 53 55 54 62 62 50 56 61 49 60 65 58 W s s s pc s s s s s s s s s s s pc s s s s s s s s s s s WORLD CITIES Today Beijing Hong Kong Jerusalem London Mexico City Moscow Paris Rome Seoul Sydney Tokyo Hi 89 87 86 69 74 79 76 83 92 73 88 (in mph) Klamath Falls 95/51 Boardman Pendleton Lo 71 79 70 58 58 63 59 67 77 51 79 W c t s r t pc sh pc c s t Sat. Hi 91 89 88 70 73 74 76 84 93 65 86 Lo 72 80 70 59 57 59 57 68 77 47 80 W s t s pc t sh pc s c s t REGIONAL FORECAST Coastal Oregon: Mostly sunny today. Warmer; patchy fog in the south in the morning. Clear tonight. Eastern and Central Oregon: Plenty of sunshine today; very warm across the north. Clear tonight. Western Washington: Blazing sunshine today. Clear tonight. Plenty of sunshine tomorrow. Eastern Washington: Plenty of sunshine today. Clear tonight. Plenty of sunshine tomorrow. Cascades: Plenty of sunshine today; very warm. Clear tonight. Plenty of sunshine tomorrow. Northern California: Clouds, then sun at the coast today; hot in central parts. Sunny elsewhere. Today Saturday NNE 7-14 NNW 6-12 NE 3-6 NNW 4-8 UV INDEX TODAY Shown is today’s weather. Temperatures are today’s highs and tonight’s lows. 1 4 6 Classiied & Legal Advertising 1-800-962-2819 or 541-278-2678 classiieds@eastoregonian.com or legals@eastoregonian.com 6 4 NEWS • To submit news tips and press releases: • call 541-966-0818 • fax 541-276-8314 • email news@eastoregonian.com • To submit community events, calendar items and Your EO News: email community@eastoregonian.com or call Tammy Malgesini at 541-564-4539 or Renee Struthers in at 541-966-0818. • To submit engagements, weddings and anniversaries: email rstruthers@eastoregonian.com or visit www.eastoregonian. com/community/announcements • To submit a Letter to the Editor: mail to Managing Editor Daniel Wattenburger, 211 S.E. Byers Ave. Pendleton, OR 97801 or email editor@eastoregonian.com. • To submit sports or outdoors information or tips: 541-966-0838 • sports@eastoregonian.com COMMERCIAL PRINTING Production Manager: Mike Jensen 541-215-0824 • mjensen@eastoregonian.com Shown are noon positions of weather systems and precipitation. Temperature bands are highs for the day. WINDS Medford 111/67 Corrections The East Oregonian works hard to be accurate and sincerely regrets any errors. If you notice a mistake in the paper, please call 541-966-0818. NATIONAL WEATHER TODAY Sat. Hi 75 89 92 68 93 88 101 93 98 96 95 92 89 108 63 66 93 95 95 100 95 101 90 90 98 95 98 PORTLAND (AP) — Seven companies have offered millions of dollars to buy a Portland property that had been slated to become a large homeless shelter. The development companies offered between $6 million and $10 million for the warehouse, possibly complicating the City Council’s plans to convert it into a shelter for up to 400 people, reported The Oregonian/Oregon Live. Portland’s sewer bureau had been taking offers for the 14-acre property. But last week, the City Council voted that the bureau should lease the space to the housing division for at least $10,000 a month. The purchase offers, revealed Wednesday in response to a public records request, complicate an ongoing disagreement about the value of the property. City oficials don’t know how much the shelter will cost or who will pay for it, but developer Homer Williams has promised to come up with private money to operate a mass homeless shelter. He didn’t submit an offer to buy the waterfront property. According to Multnomah County property records, the sewer bureau bought the property for about $6.33 million in 2004 and it has a current market value of $8.6 million. SEATTLE (AP) — U.S. and Canadian Coast Guard crews were working to make sure ive people on a sailboat that was taking in water off the Washington Coast made it safely to Tillamook. Coast Guard oficials say they received a report Wednesday that a 43-foot sailing vessel was taking on water 218 miles west of La Push in 20-foot seas and 30-mph winds. An electrical pump onboard couldn’t handle the looding and people were using buckets to bail water. Two Coast Guard aircrews lew from REGIONAL CITIES Forecast Purchase offers complicate Portland shelter Coast Guard helps sailors in high seas off Coast Advertising Director: Jennine Perkinson 541-278-2669 • jperkinson@eastoregonian.com Advertising Services: Laura Jensen 541-966-0806 • ljensen@eastoregonian.com Multimedia Consultants: • Terri Briggs 541-278-2678 • tbriggs@eastoregonian.com • Amanda Jacobs 541-278-2683 • ajacobs@eastoregonian.com • Jeanne Jewett 541-564-4531 • jjewett@eastoregonian.com • Chris McClellan 541-966-0827 • cmcclellan@eastoregonian.com • Stephanie Newsom 541-278-2687 • snewsom@eastoregonian.com • Dayle Stinson 541-278-2670 • dstinson@eastoregonian.com • Audra Workman 541-564-4538 • aworkman@eastoregonian.com Didn’t receive your paper? Call 1-800-522-0255 before noon Tuesday through Friday or before 10 a.m. Saturday for same-day redelivery — Founded Oct. 16, 1875 — SATURDAY GRESHAM (AP) — Police in Gresham, Oregon, arrested a Meals on Wheels volunteer accused of killing a Chihuahua that belonged to a disabled woman for whom he delivered food. The department said Thursday the incident happened Aug. 8. June Rigsby told police she was in bed when the volunteer arrived with a meal, a task he had been doing every Monday for months. Rigsby says her three dogs jumped off the bed to greet him. She later heard a thud and only two dogs returned. After the volunteer left, Rigsby found the Chihuahua named “Baby” dead on the kitchen loor. Police say the volunteer, 68-year-old Donald Nicoli, remembered kicking the dog, but couldn’t recall much else about what happened. He’s been charged with aggravated animal abuse. An examination at Oregon State University found the dog died from blunt force trauma and skull fractures. “It’s hard to keep these pharmacies open six or seven days a week.” Subscriber services: For home delivery, vacation stops or delivery concerns: 1-800-522-0255 Warrenton with the pump while another aircrew from Sacramento, California provided cover. Upon arrival, the sailors declined to be hoisted off the boat but the new pump worked to control the looding. An aircrew from Prince Rupert, British Columbia is providing aerial surveillance over the vessel and Coast Guard personnel are maintaining communication with the sailboat crew as they travel. Volunteer accused of killing dog during food delivery get the prescription illed. largely a resource issue. The Murrays have taken multiple “Hospital pharmacies aren’t set up steps to limit the impact on their to do the outpatient billing of insurance, community residents. They publish so that’s a huge barrier,” she said. “It an emergency number that local resi- might mean an extra pharmacist when dents can call if they cannot wait until you only have one, so that’s a signiicant morning or through the weekend to ill amount of staff increase and money.” a script. Michael Powell, pharmacy director “I fear that it does affect admis- at St. Charles Bend said he believed that sions,” he said. “We try to provide lack of pharmacy access did contribute services and get it to them when they to readmission rates, although the need it. But say that hospital had not person is timid, or yet quantiied the feels it’s an impo- impact. The hospital sition, even though is running a pilot it’s endangering program on one their health. The nursing unit, having wait to get medicine pharmacists deliver or going without prescriptions and medicine is always counsel patients at a bad thing.” their bedside prior Patients treated — John Murray, to discharge. That for pneumonia Runs only pharmacies in also helps to iden- might be started Morrow, Gilliam, Sherman and tify when patients on antibiotics and are unable to afford Wheeler counties then sent home their medications so with a prescription they can be referred for more. But if they can’t get to a to the hospital’s assistance programs. pharmacy to ill that prescription for a “I do believe that we will have day or two, that infection could return. signiicant positive impact on readmis- Or heart failure patients who can’t ill sion rates through these programs,” a prescription for a diuretic could see Powell said. “But we do not have data luid build up in their lungs and have to show this yet.” dificulty breathing. The OSU researchers also found The researchers found that some that pharmacies and hospitals tended rural areas had only a single pharmacy, to be located close together. So open 54 hours per week. patients who lived farther from a “There’s only two 24-hour pharma- hospital had more dificulty illing cies in the state of Oregon, and both are their prescriptions. in the Portland area,” said David Lee, Some Murray’s Drug customers an OSU assistant professor of phar- must travel three hours round trip to macy and senior author of the study. pick up their medications. If someone “So if you need medication at kind of forgets or has trouble making the trip, an odd hour, the only place you can do the Murrays are often there to close it is Portland.” the gap. Two months ago, a patient in Because pharmacy access was Fossil had run out of medications, so lower in rural areas, the analysis could the Murrays sent an employee from not tease out the different impact of their Condon store on a two-hour pharmacy hours versus other limita- delivery trip. tions of rural areas — such as the lack “That’s the kind of stuff we do in of doctors or support services — that rural areas,” he said. “It doesn’t pay could also play a role in higher read- not to help people.” mission rates. Lee said mail-order services could “There’s been research showing help improve medication access for that rural communities have less access patients in rural areas, but recom- to physicians and other health care mended that hospitals follow up with a entities,” Bissonnette said. “We think phone call to ensure that patients know it’s important to consider pharmacies how to take their medication and what as well.” their potential side effects could be. But hospitals now have a vested The Murrays, however, counter interest in ensuring patients can get that mail-order pharmacies are hurting their medications after discharge. Since access. As more insurance companies 2010, Medicare has levied increasing require patients to use mail-order inancial penalties on hospitals if too pharmacies, they’re putting inde- many patients need to be readmitted pendent drug stores out of business. within 30 days. Some hospitals across And that might leave a discharged the country are now opening dispensa- patient nowhere to ill prescriptions ries to ensure their patients aren’t going on a same-day basis. The Murrays without. and other independent pharmacists Bissonnette said while some states in Oregon are pushing for legislation have regulations that prevent hospitals that would prevent pharmacy beneit from sending patients home with more managers from excluding community than a day’s supply of medications, it’s pharmacies. By MARKIAN HAWRYLUK Bend Bulletin TODAY BRIEFLY 1 8 a.m. 10 a.m. Noon 2 p.m. 4 p.m. 6 p.m. 0-2, Low 3-5, Moderate 6-7, High; 8-10, Very High; 11+, Extreme The higher the AccuWeather.com UV Index™ num- ber, the greater the need for eye and skin protection. Forecasts and graphics provided by AccuWeather, Inc. ©2016 -10s -0s showers t-storms 0s 10s rain 20s flurries 30s 40s snow ice 50s 60s cold front 70s 80s 90s 100s warm front stationary front 110s high low National Summary: Storms will dot much of the Southeastern states today. Severe storms will extend from Oklahoma and Colorado to Wisconsin. As cool air invades the northern Plains, heat will hold on in the Northwest. Yesterday’s National Extremes: (for the 48 contiguous states) High 109° in Needles, Calif. Low 32° in Angel Fire, N.M. 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