Patient Care Automation Services Inc. (PCAS) is the developer of the PharmaTrust® MedCentre which is designed for use in hospitals, pharmacies, medical clinics and workplaces. About a dozen countries are already interested in the product.It operates much like an automated bank machine - insert your paper prescription into the machine or pick up a phone, it then connects electronically via video to an actual pharmacist who can answer any questions the patient has and then sign off on the prescription before the drugs are dispensed.
The company received a $1.5-million grant from the National Research Council of Canada today that will assist in further development and marketing it across Canada, the U.S. and the UK.
This is the company the Canadian government expressed an interest in within a press release from October 13th, and was previously covered here at the Telepharmacy blog.
UPDATE 1: October 28, more press on the Telepharmacy machine: Fierce Healthcare ran this article, complete with announcements from Canadian government officials from the National Research Council and the Minister of State for Science and Technology's office about funding the project. The article also has new info about the system's use:
Currently, trials are taking place at Sunnybrook Hospital in Toronto, under the supervision of the hospital's pharmacy; there are production sites at the Albany Clinic, in Toronto, and Cambridge Memorial Hospital, in Cambridge, Ont.UPDATE 2: Nov, here is the National Research Council's official statement.The system is under evaluation as a pandemic response platform by researchers at the University Health Network and the company has also just recently received approval to deploy its system in select locations in the UK.
