Faces of 340B

Kevin Jones, 340B Program Director, Intermountain Healthcare, UT

Frequent hospitalizations are not just hard on patients, their families, and their caregivers – they also incur significant costs for the entire health system. This is especially true for patients with treatable chronic illnesses who are unable to control their medical conditions. For one such patient at Intermountain Healthcare, an integrated health delivery system in Utah, an inability to afford needed insulin resulted in her being admitted to the hospital 32 times over the course of 14 months. But in the more than three years since Intermountain put the patient on its voucher program that uses 340B program savings to offer insulin and other medications at deep discounts, the patient has not had a single admission. Kevin Jones, who directs the 340B program for Intermountain, says such patient assistance is a big part of how the system uses 340B to help patients live their healthiest life possible – in keeping with the system’s motto of “Healing for Life.” Intermountain also uses 340B savings to fund a voucher program at its anticoagulation clinic, in-room delivery for prescription medications, local chemotherapy services at its rural locations, and more.