Medication management in hospice care presents unique challenges, particularly as organizations expand to include multiple offices and prescribers. Balancing cost containment with quality care can be a daunting task for even the most experienced hospice leaders especially as the industry adjusts to quality reporting requirements like the HOPE assessment tool. Enclara Pharmacia offers a comprehensive solution designed to address these complexities through data-driven decision-making and meaningful partnerships. By integrating clinical pharmacist guidance into account management, Enclara aims to simplify medication management, reduce costs, and improve patient outcomes.
Addressing Gaps in Hospice Medication Practices
One of the primary challenges of hospice medication management is that standard prescribing guidelines do not always align with the unique needs of patients at the end of life. There is a lack of peer-reviewed prescribing guidance specific to hospice care, leading to significant variance in prescribing patterns between hospices. These inconsistencies can make it difficult for hospice organizations to establish and adhere to pharmacy utilization goals. Enclara bridges these gaps by pairing hospices with experienced pharmacists who serve as both clinical and business consultants. These pharmacists collaborate closely with hospice leadership to implement strategies that improve clinical outcomes while optimizing financial performance. The approach is built on trust and actionable insights, ensuring that hospices receive guidance that reflects their unique needs, goals, and values.
Harnessing Data for Smarter Prescribing
A key feature of Enclara’s program is Enclarity™, a proprietary reporting system that provides hospices and Enclara clinical managers with detailed insights into prescribing trends. This platform contextualizes data into a narrative that helps organizations make informed decisions. As the nation’s largest hospice pharmacy services provider, Enclara’s utilization dataset enables hospices to benchmark their prescribing practices against utilization patterns of similar organizations in their region. This highlights opportunities for improvement, such as optimizing per-patient medication spending by addressing prescription volume and cost per prescription.
For example, one metric tracks the percentage of medications a hospice covers upon admission that patients continue taking weeks later, including those that are common targets for deprescribing. By providing market context, Enclara helps hospices align prescribing with industry-wide standards of care by identifying when they are outliers in continuing to cover medications that others typically discontinue.
From Insight to Action – Customized Strategies that Work
Backed by decades of hospice pharmacology expertise, Enclara’s clinical pharmacist managers serve as strategic allies by collaborating with hospice teams to turn insights into tangible improvements. These efforts may include creating custom formularies, developing exception-approval workflows, or developing staff training. One area of focus is deprescribing, which involves discontinuing maintenance medications that may no longer be relevant or helpful to patients with limited prognoses. This practice reduces the burden of swallowing pills, minimizes side effects, and limits the potential for interactions with palliative treatments the hospice provides. For families, deprescribing can offer clarity and peace of mind that ensures treatment aligns with patient goals and reduces unnecessary interventions.
As hospices prepare for the implementation of the HOPE assessment tool in October 2025, Enclara’s approach aligns with the increased emphasis on real time patient data and interdisciplinary care planning. By supporting consistent prescribing practices and documentation workflows, Enclara helps hospices position themselves for compliance with HOPE’s expanded reporting requirements, including hospice update visits and symptoms follow up protocols.
Bridging Clinical and Operational Gaps Through Collaboration
Enclara’s clinical support model is distinguished by the collaboration between pharmacists and account managers, who work together to optimize every aspect of a hospice’s medication management workflows. This dual approach ensures that both clinical and operational objectives are addressed, providing a level of support that sets Enclara apart in the market. Transparency and flexibility are central to this model, with evidence-based cost-saving estimates derived from actual market trends. Even small adjustments, such as modest reductions in prescription volume, can lead to significant financial savings without compromising the best possible patient care. While every hospice is different, many Enclara clients implementing prescribing volume best practices reduce per patient day medication spending by two dollars or more. For a hospice with an average daily census of 100, that could mean nearly $75,000 in annual savings.
Building Clinical Confidence
Education is a cornerstone of Enclara’s clinical support model. Through targeted training, hospice interdisciplinary teams gain the confidence to make medication decisions that balance clinical and cost considerations. Resources such as conversational guides for nurses and risk-assessment tools for prescribers further support the application of this training. These resources also support readiness for evolving standards such as the HOPE assessment tool, helping teams align clinical decisions with documentation expectations. Enclara is also committed to clinical thought leadership, sharing insights and best practices with the broader hospice community through open-access articles, including the monthly Palliative Pearls series, as well as presentations at national and state-level conferences.
Compassionate Care and Operational Efficiency
Hospice care is about more than symptom management: It’s about delivering a compassionate, high-quality experience for patients and families while maintaining operational excellence. Enclara’s unique combination of expertise, personalized solutions, and market-leading data positions the company as a valuable partner for hospices seeking to improve quality, manage costs, and optimize nurse and prescriber workflows.
