MICC 2020-19 FAR-Part 8_ 1 Jul 2020 Pharmacy Shelving_Redacted.pdf

MICC Control No: Sam Houston 2020-19 Contractor: RC Smith Company

Program/Equipment: MEDCOM/BAMC Pharmacy Shelving

FOR OFFICIAL USE ONLY

FAR 8.405-6(b)(1). Items peculiar to one manufacturer. An item peculiar to one manufacturer can be a particular brand name, product, or a feature of a product, peculiar to one manufacturer. A brand name item, whether available on one or more schedule contracts, is an item peculiar to one manufacturer.

5. Reason for Authority Cited:

a. This action must be accomplished through a sole source solution as the pharmacy shelving system will require significant integration with the existing ScriptPro Automation dispensing systems within the Taylor Burke pharmacy, and R.C. Smith Company is the only company who can provide all of the requirements necessary. The pharmacy construction design and automation dispensing systems must be efficiently integrated with each other to ensure it has an operational workflow design. The new system at the Fort Sam Houston AAFES needs to match other existing systems.

b. The BAMC PX and Taylor Burk pharmacies provides pharmaceutical care and services to approximately 150,000 beneficiaries annually. These two pharmacies dispenses approximately 370,000 prescriptions annually. The BAMC PX pharmacy mission is to process all called in refill prescriptions for four BAMC outpatient pharmacies. Their mission is also to process new civilian prescriptions for patients. They primarily fill 80% of all new off post civilian prescriptions for BAMC brought in by patients from civilian providers. The Taylor Burk pharmacy serves as the pharmacy for this medical home clinic patients. It is the only pharmacy for Soldier medical care on Camp Bullis that supports the Camp Bullis military training areas mission.

c. R. C. Smith Company is the only vendor that can satisfy the required minimum essential characteristics (MECs) necessary (see paragraph 7). R. C. Smith Company has been used at several other Army Medical Troop Facilities (MTF) pharmacies in recent years and from all discussions with these sites R. C. Smith has performed satisfactory. RC Smith Company currently has a GSA Contract (GS-07F-238B) effective until June 18, 2024. They are a cabinet supplier for government establishments, including the Department of Veteran Affairs. All federal agencies, the VA Medical System, as well as the Department of Defense are considered authorized VA customers.

Similarly to other GSA-approved customers, R.C. Smith pays for freight on domestic Veteran Affairs shipments for the 48 contiguous states. This purchase will be made through their GSA contract. R.C. Smith has the required experience and expertise to provide the identified equipment that will meet the Army’s needs.

d. Alternatives are not feasible at this time. In addition to no other vendor being able to provide the minimum requirements, for the Taylor Burke Pharmacy, RC Smith Company’s equipment is already in use. It is not advantageous to the government to install a brand new system at that pharmacy. Although, the AAFES Pharmacy at Fort Sam Houston, TX is a new build, consistency in Pharmacy design is necessary to meet the minimum requirements.

MICC Control No: Sam Houston 2020-19 Contractor: RC Smith Company

Program/Equipment: MEDCOM/BAMC Pharmacy Shelving

FOR OFFICIAL USE ONLY

e. Justification: A purpose designed and installed pharmaceutical shelving system is required to interface with the pharmacy automation systems and the dispensing windows. The shelving system will require significant integration with the ScriptPro automation dispensing systems within the pharmacies. The new pharmacy construction design and automation dispensing systems must be efficiently integrated with each other to ensure the pharmacies have an operational workflow design. The integration process of the automation and the shelving system must be completed and in place prior to the projected November 2020 grand opening date. The benefit to project is to assure that automation dispensing equipment in the pharmacy operations integrates seamlessly with the case work/shelving system and improve patient customer service experience and safety. The case work and shelving system has been shown to utilize storage and functional space 30-40% more effectively than cantilever style competition systems while also offering much higher load capacities. R.C. Smith/MMI purchases their own pharmacy automation equipment (i.e. ScriptPro, Parata, etc.) for their pharmacy case work and shelving systems design labs to ensure their products fits and flow efficiently within new pharmacy designs. The R.C Smith/MMI shelving system provides the flexibility to the customer to adjust the shelving from the normal horizontal level shelves to a customer preferred diagonal angle shelves which is necessary in the pharmacy operation workflow, which no other vendor provides. In addition, part of the requirement is to have integrated power in cabinets, shelving units on wheels, gravity fed drawers, lateral manual carriage, and prewired cabinets, all of which R.C. Smith provides. The pharmacy design that is required for these two pharmacy projects require we use R.C.Smith/MMI to provide the necessary operational workflow. This is important because the bottom-line is to already have in place the case work and shelving systems that will be 100% functional for an efficient operational flow.

f. R.C. Smith is the only company that can provide this requirement. Competition would not make a difference because no other capable vendor responded to the sources sought or could provide the integrated system needed.

g. Impact: Because R.C. Smith/MMI Company is the only company who can provide all of the required features necessary, if they are not used for these pharmacy projects, it would create a mission failure for patient care and patient safety. It would cause significant/major workflow disruptions to the operational flow and efficiency for patient care because another system would not provide the minimal requirements. We would have a direct negative impact for patient wait times increasing to unsatisfactory levels for patients and directly negatively impact our customer service scores. The outpatient pharmacy customer service experience for patients relies heavily on how long the patient waits for medications in the pharmacy lobbies. In order to decrease pharmacy wait times, we must have a workflow system that provides direct efficiency for our processes. Patient safety is directly negatively impacted when we have increased medication errors and often times we tend to first look at the human factors for the cause of medication errors. We should also focus directly on the work environment of the pharmacy staff to ensure they have the right work environment in order to prevent medication errors from happening. Having the right workflow with the right pharmacy shelving/casework is key to preventing medication errors for pharmacy patients.