Responding to surge in demand, Pharmacy of Grace opens new location in Shawnee

KSHB 41 News anchor Taylor Hemness reports on stories across Kansas, including a focus on consumer issues. You can contact Taylor by email.

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Four years ago, I first told you about a new pharmacy in Kansas City, Kansas, specifically catering to the uninsured and underinsured.

On the first day, the staff fulfilled six prescriptions. Now, they’re doing about 130 every day. Today, Pharmacy of Grace is preparing to open its second location in Shawnee.

This is a full-service pharmacy, but it opened as the only standalone charitable pharmacy in the state of Kansas.

The mission is to provide more affordable medication for people in need, in some cases saving patients literally hundreds of dollars.

"Their insurance may not cover a medication," CEO Michael Fink told me. "And they're just coming to us to look for help in their medication counseling, or to get a little better price than what they've been able to find at other retail locations."

But even more than that, the pharmacy works to overcome language barriers, to make sure patients fully understand how, and for how long, they’re supposed to take medications.

Austen Nordstrom/Pharmacy of Grace

Fink told me in my original coverage how often those instructions aren’t followed because of a lack of patient understanding, which can be detrimental to their health.

I asked the Fink this week how the organization identified Shawnee as an appropriate spot for a second location.

“We had seen that there was about 2,000 residents around this location that are uninsured," Fink said. "And then there's a Title I school real close to us, where 86% of those students received subsidized food or lunches. So that was kind of our study or background of like, 'Do we need to go to Shawnee or do we need to look for another location?' And Shawnee was just a great fit for us.”

The pharmacy will hold a ribbon-cutting on Wednesday at its new location near W. 75th Street and Quivira Road. But Fink told me that he and other pharmacy leaders are already working to identify the next location, with as many as ten possibilities they’re considering.

For now, a person's location or insurance status does not matter.

"If you have insurance, we most likely take it. You're always willing or welcome to come in and ask the pharmacist questions," Fink said. "And of course, for those uninsured patients, Kansas side, Missouri side, we're able to take both sets of patients and help them out as best we can."

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