Dallas billionaire Mark Cuban’s promise to shake up the health care industry is beginning to take shape.
Cuban’s Dallas-based pharmaceutical company, Mark Cuban Cost Plus Drug Co., is expanding its partnership with Community Health Systems, a hospital operator based in Franklin, Tenn. It will allow the hospital operator to sell more drugs to all of its hospitals.
Community Health Systems signed onto Cost Plus Drug earlier this year and became the first national health care system to purchase drugs through Cuban’s company. The news came out at nearly the same time that Cost Plus announced it would produce its own medications in a Deep Ellum facility.
The two projects are not connected, and the drugs sold to Community Health won’t come from Deep Ellum, But Texans who use any of Community Health’s seven hospitals in the state may feel the impact soon. Community Health locations include Corsicana and Granbury.
The deal means all of Community Health’s 71 hospitals across 15 states will be eligible to purchase 12 more medications, including antibiotics, from Cost Plus. The company has a strong presence in the South with locations in Oklahoma, Mississippi, Georgia and more.
Previously, Community Health Systems was only purchasing blood pressure medications norepinephrine and epinephrine. Epinephrine is especially important since it’s been in short supply for over a decade, according to Becker’s Hospital Review.
But this expansion will allow Community Health Systems to purchase 12 medications that are used to treat nausea in patients undergoing chemotherapy, infections, glaucoma, acid reflux, hyponatremia and other conditions.
Cost Plus Drug did not provide The Dallas Morning News with an exact list of medications it is selling to Community Health Systems at the time of publication.
It’s another big moment for Cost Plus as it’s a sign that its unique approach in selling medications at a 15% markup along with a $3 pharmacy fee and a $5 shipping cost is attracting the attention of hospital operators, said Dr. Alex Oshmyansky, Cost Plus Drugs CEO and founder.
The extra attention made Cost Plus realize that the wholesale market could be a part of the company’s growth, Oshmyansky said.
“Even these big hospitals notice that we’re buying at a better price than they are. So a question we get asked all the time is, ‘Hey, can we just buy from you in bulk?’” he said in a phone interview with The News. “So after getting that request a lot, we decided to set up a wholesale marketplace to connect health systems to wholesalers that we purchase from in part as well. It’s in addition to our direct manufacturer relationships.”
Cost Plus launched its wholesale market in February and Community Health Systems may be the first of many to capitalize on the low prices that Cuban’s startup is offering, Oshmyansky said.
“We can’t say which hospitals, but we have a number of different hospital systems from around the country already working with us,” Oshmyansky said. “I think we’re starting to pick up steam, and more are signing up every day. It’s onward and upward from here.”
Expanding the deal with Community Health was a no-brainer for Cuban since the company has been a good partner for him and Cost Plus, Cuban said in an email to The News.
“The expansion of our relationship allows all CHS entities to work with us not just for the injectables we manufacture, but also a full range of products through our business, costplusdrugs.com marketplace,” Cuban said. “CHS has done a great job of partnering with us to make sure that together we can provide better solutions at a far better price for their patients.”
