We’ve all been in this situation: You need to fill a prescription and you’re not feeling up to driving to the pharmacy, or you’ve just been discharged from a hospital stay and can’t get to the drug store.
Wouldn’t it be nice to have your prescription delivered to you, particularly by someone in your community who knows your name and some background on your medical history?
Well, we do have this right here in Beaver County. The Hometown Pharmacy is owned and operated by two local residents: Bob Ekiert and Wanda Mrozek (who also happen to be brother and sister).
“We are hometown people ourselves, and we know our customers by their first names,” Bob comments. “We treat our patients like family members. We take our time with them and answer whatever questions they may have.”
New Castle natives Bob and Wanda started in business together in 1999 with a store in New Castle, inside Joseph’s Supermarket. In 2000, Hometown opened its second location in Cornersburg, Ohio, followed by Struthers a few years later and the opening of a headquarters location in Poland/Boardman under the Hometown Pharmacy Solutions (HPS) name.
The business continued to gradually expand and in 2007, RXIS Institutional Services opened a full-service pharmacy serving group homes, adult daycare programs, personal care, skilled nursing and assisted living facilities throughout the region.
A compounding pharmacy and a pharmacy consulting business soon followed. On-site compounding allows the pharmacist to mix drugs to fit the unique needs of each patient. “This may be done for medically necessary reasons, such as to change the form of the medication from a solid pill to a liquid, to avoid a non-essential ingredient that the patient is allergic to, or to obtain the exact dose needed,” Bob explains.
Today, Hometown has grown to 16 locations in Pennsylvania and Ohio. The Beaver County locations are 4969 Tuscarawas Road on Beaver and 3589 Brodhead Road on Monaca. They continue to combine a variety of personalized services and high quality products with a knowledgeable, friendly staff that promotes healthy living throughout
the community.
The staff prides themselves on something that is too rare these days: personalized customer service. “We have a 15-minute wait. We don’t believe you should have to wait any longer than that,” Bob says. “You’re in and you’re out. And we do deliver for free within a 10-mile radius of the store.
The staff particularly enjoys serving older adults. “The seniors are the ones who are the more challenged patients because they have Medicare Part D insurance,” Bob says. “Sometimes they feel forced to go to a certain big chain pharmacy but it’s not true that they have to. They can go to any independent pharmacy to get their prescriptions filled.”
Bob knows that when customers are well served, they remember the experience. “I waited on one patient who had to fill a ‘script for blood pressure pills, and he had lost the prescription and had no idea what to do. He had gone to a chain drug store and was told the insurance wouldn’t cover it so he’d have to pay cash. Then one of his family members told him to come here. I called his doctor and explained what had happened. That patient was able fill the ‘script for a little over what their co-pay would have been–$6 instead of $60. That was 20 years ago, and that person has been my patient ever since.”
Hometown Pharmacy Solutions is headquartered at 8571 Foxwood Court A in Youngstown, Ohio. To learn more, call (330) 316-3926 or visit thehometownpharmacies.com.
By Gina Mazza
For Beaver County Senior News
Photo caption: Bob Ekiert and Wanda Mrozek, owners of The Hometown Pharmacy.